Young Volcanoes
by Scrax
Summary: How do you pretend that you aren't in love with someone? The simplest answer is, of course, that you don't. Sequel to my other fic, Alone Together. Violence, Non-Con, and Sexual Warnings.
1. Prologue

Tonight, the foxes hunt the hounds

It's all over now

Before it has begun

We've already won

We are wild

We are like young volcanoes

We are wild

Americana, exotica

Do you wanna feel a little beautiful, baby?

-Fall Out Boy, Young Volcanoes

Prologue

"I really think that you'll love it here," her mother said sweetly. The tall blonde watched as trees slid by the car as they drove through the small town. She'd never seen anything like this place. Even in the center of town, there were trees and grass and people had full lawns out in front of their houses with wooden picket fences instead of chain-linked ones.

"Doubt that," she muttered, her brilliant blue eyes losing focus. She hadn't hated the idea of moving out of Jersey but once she'd seen their destination for the first time a few weeks ago that had all changed. She'd gone with them to pick out the house and sure, it was beautiful, but it was far too big and, much like the town, far too empty.

She'd hunted around the internet for hours upon hours trying to find anything to entertain herself with once the move was complete but there was absolutely nothing in store for her here. No night clubs, no bars she could lie her way into, nothing.

There weren't even any lame things to do around. Bowling alleys had all closed up years ago. That meant no pool leagues, no darts games, just nothing. She didn't know anybody and if she was being honest, she didn't want to know anybody.

When they pulled up to the house she let out a heavy sigh as she slung the strap of her army surplus satchel bag over her shoulder and got out of the car. She hated long car rides. They'd always made her feel sick and she could hardly ever ignore it by falling asleep. She shut the door behind her and stared up at the white house as her parents began to unpack the trunk. They hadn't packed much of anything from home. Just some clothes and their valuables. The house was already furnished and yet again the girl had to wonder where all the money came from.

There had been many situations that made her question where exactly her parents had gotten their wealth from. Neither of them worked and as far as she could remember they had never struggled. They had told her that they'd inherited a large sum of money from dead relatives that she had never met and never thought it necessary to explain any further than that. Anything she ever wanted, she'd had without needing to beg.

The only things she was looking forward too here were the trees. They had moved at the perfect time to see them all at their best. It was the dead middle of October and all the trees were different colors, ranging from bright green all the way through every shade of orange and red and brown. The city had been beautiful, but in a much different way than this. Neon lights were replaced here with the gentle light of the sun shining through the rainbow of leaves. The girl grabbed her suitcase from the pavement and walked toward the house with her parents in front of her.

She was glad she had at least finished high school back in Jersey so she wouldn't be forced to meet hundreds of new people her age right away. She could try her best to not meet anybody at all if she wanted to. As they walked inside she began to climb the staircase in the entryway up to the second floor. On the landing, she turned right and into her bedroom. There was already a desk and a bed inside, an end table with a lamp and a bureau too. She dropped the suitcase at the base of the bed and let her bag fall on the mattress. The room was painted a bright baby blue that almost matched her eyes perfectly.

She pulled her wallet from the bag and headed for the door, stuffing it into the pouch of her hoodie where her phone sat. At the bottom of the stairs, she could hear her parents unpacking in their bedroom across the first floor of the house. "Gonna hit the gas station. Want anything?" She called out, but neither of them seemed to hear her. She waited another moment before she shrugged and walked out the front door, down the walkway and onto the sidewalk.

The sidewalks here weren't like the ones in the city. They were old and cracked and uneven everywhere she looked. Some were missing large chunks and the earth had grown up between them as if they were so underused that the town had decided they weren't worth fixing.

As she made it to the parking lot of the gas station she looked around quickly before dropping her vision to the pavement. It was only day one. She didn't want to be locking eyes with anyone. Especially given her more enjoyable activities when meeting new people that she found particularly attractive. She didn't need to be bringing a boy or girl home on the first night in town.

As she made it to the door and went through she felt the warm air wash through her and she shivered, not realizing how cold she'd been. She let the door close at first until she heard footsteps behind her and she caught the door before it shut in the girl's face.

She must have run to the door because the girl hadn't noticed her outside. "Thanks," the pink-haired girl smiled and pushed past her into the store.

She didn't respond, opting instead to silently admire the girl. She was on the tall side, though not quite as tall as herself. She had an hour-glass shape that made the girl jealous as she peaked at her over the top of the aisle filled with candy and pastries.

The pink-haired girl caught her looking and smiled shyly. She'd been caught staring but she didn't much care. Hey eyes were a soft pastel pink that matched her hair a little too perfectly. The girl smiled back politely but returned her vision to the shelves after only a moment. She watched as the girl grabbed what she wanted and headed for the register.

The blonde reached down and grabbed a pack of gummy worms and turned to head for the register but when she did she saw the girl was already at the door. "I already paid," she whispered to the clerk and the blonde watched as his eyes seemed to glaze over for a moment before he nodded to her. The pink-haired girl left and the door shut slowly behind her and the blonde watched as she ran across the parking lot and into the woods across the street.

Her vision lingered there for several moments before she heard the clerk clear his throat impatiently. His face had returned to normal and he seemed to be waiting impatiently for her to finish gawking at the now empty space where the girl had disappeared into the treeline.

"Sorry," she sighed before she took the final few steps to the register.

"Thought I saw something."


	2. Chapter 1

When the morning comes

When we see what we've become

In the cold light of day we're a flame in the wind

Not the fire that we've begun

Every argument, every word we can't take back

'Cause with the all that has happened

I think that we both know the way that the story ends

-Marshmello and Bastile, Happier

Chapter One

'Alone Together.' The words had been working their way through her mind for weeks now. Each time they chimed they got just a little bit louder and she was beginning to think that she may no longer be able to contain them in her mind. Another song she'd forgotten about somewhere along the way that Thorn had reminded her of. And yet again this song was not a positive reflection of their relationship, or lack of one. Her fingers threaded through the carpeting of the hallway as she tried to get lost in her thoughts.

She and Thorn had been living together now for nearly a month. The new year was right around the corner and through the last few weeks, she had finally begun to grasp the difficulty of her self given task.

It had been okay at first. The high of succeeding in getting her necklace back and getting home safe had given them plenty to talk about over the first few days of being home. But as those words ran dry she'd struggled to keep the wolfman talking. He was unwilling to talk about himself and she wasn't quite ready to start digging through her past either given the new trauma that came with thinking about it.

It wouldn't have been so bad if they'd both had jobs but Thorn had been laid off after coming home and was too weak to look for a part-time job for the winter and he missed the seasonal window. Nikki had tried but she'd soon found out that she had no documentation to give out. So while Thorn was able to collect a pitiful unemployment check she was forced to face the moral dilemma of glamouring humans to give her a job illegally or under the table.

Of course, the only under the table jobs around here during winter were pet sitting, kid sitting, or shoveling snow.

When she'd gone back to sift through the paperwork in her caretaker's house she'd found nothing at all. Worse, when she'd called a realtor to come to look at the house she'd found out that the faeries that were assigned to watch her hadn't had any moral dilemma at all when moving out to Connecticut. They'd found an abandoned house, glamoured it up, and glamoured anyone who came asking questions about it. No deed, no faked birth certificates, nothing. She hadn't even gone to get a driver's license so she couldn't use that either. As the days passed the glamour began to peel off the house to reveal the rotting wood of a complete dump.

So not only could she not prove to anybody that she did, in fact, belong there, she had no house to sell, no money to help Thorn pay the bills, and no way to earn any in a normal human way either.

During that first week, she had used her magic only a handful of times, to get her caretakers cremated and to get the cops to stop asking questions about the corpses 'body mods.' She'd squirmed at the idea that humans would ever do that to themselves on purpose, elongating their ears or tattooing their eyeballs. It made her gag but she'd struggled through it so she could at least spread their ashes. Thorn had gone with her and she'd spread them out behind the house, not knowing where else they should go.

But as their ability to talk about things other than their feelings dwindled, the two had barely spoken at all. She had expected that after he'd regained his strength they would talk about all the shit that hung in the air between them but he'd only pushed her away.

He'd been having nightmares nearly every other night. The first few times she'd come in and sat down beside him and sang to him to calm him down or to try and soothe him back to sleep. He must not have enjoyed his dependence on it because he'd told her to get out one night and she hadn't dared to go back in since. Some nights he would wake in a total panic and run from his room only to find her waiting for him. When he'd woken up and realized he was at home and safe, he'd ranted on about how she shouldn't be waiting for him like this. How helpless it made him feel that she was always there, waiting for him to need her.

She understood what he'd meant but she couldn't figure out why he hated needing help so much. Was it a human thing or was it just a Thorn thing? Here she was again though, sitting on the floor in the living room, around the corner so he wouldn't be able to see her if he came rushing out of his room again. She dared not go closer but every bone in her body ached to go and calm him.

She'd thought it would be different than this. After he'd admitted to not being enchanted in the cabin she'd longed for that to become normal for them but it simply hadn't. She hadn't touched him in days. She forced her way into a hug a few times in the first few weeks, kissed him once or twice in the first few days but that was all. She'd tried to escalate these encounters but she'd been denied every time.

She'd started seeing him out in town when she went out to hunt for work. Started her habit of glamouring men to look like him back up after she'd thought she might have it under control. She hadn't grabbed any of them yet, thankfully, but it was becoming increasingly difficult to walk past her own illusions.

Her only escape from the drama had been when Val had come to visit them for a few days. She'd wanted to check up on Thorn but to Nikki's surprise, she'd actually wanted to check up on her more. She hadn't found it possible to talk to Thorn about how she'd killed that troll in the Court of Teeth but she'd found it much easier to talk about with Val. She'd been there. She was able to bring it up when Nikki couldn't quite find the words. While that had helped, Val had still been insistent that it wasn't her place to tell her Thorn's business and sadly Nikki had agreed with her at the time.

It was then that she was ripped from her thoughts as she heard Thorn jolt up in bed and let out a small yelp of fear. She stood as she heard him jump from the bed and run for his door. She pressed herself, front first, into the corner of the wall she was hiding behind, hands over her heart as he threw open his door and ran out into the hallway, breathing so heavily she thought he might pass out.

She tried to keep her breathing as soft as possible as she reached out with her magic and tried to let it reach him and calm him down. It worked for a moment before he felt it. He turned his head toward the wall and growled, "what did I fucking say about that shit?!" He yelled and she stopped.

She could feel him staring at the corner of the wall and she slowly let her fingers creep around the corner before shyly peeking around it at him. "I'm not sorry…"

"Why would you be?! Clearly, you love doing shit against my will."

Her nails dug into the plaster of the wall as she gritted her teeth. "You need to talk about your problems Thorn," she said shakily, trying to keep from becoming emotional.

"I'm fine," he growled again, "I don't need anything!"

"You need to talk Thorn!" She shouted back at him. It was the middle of the night but she didn't care anymore, the people below them were going to have to deal with this long-overdue argument. "And I want to help you!"

"Help me?! Why? Do I look like I need fucking help!"

"No!" She yelled back as she stepped around the corner. "That's not what I meant!" She continued as she walked to him and grabbed his arm. He did look like he needed the help of course but she didn't want her words to sound the way they had. He ripped his arm away from her though before she could get a good grip on him.

"The only reason you wanna help is so you can get close to me and fuck my life up all over again!" He shouted back at her and she froze. Her hands fell to her sides as she balled them into fists and looked down at the carpet. Her tears began to flow and fall down to the carpet as she listened to his breathing become slower and slower as he calmed down.

Part of her might have been happy that he seemed to be realizing what he had said to her and was regretting it but if it was she couldn't feel it. All she could feel, to her own surprise, wasn't sadness, but instead, boiling rage.

She'd bottled her feelings up for so long that she had skipped right over sadness or regret and went straight to 'rip your eyes out' levels of anger. As her hands began to shake Thorn sucked in a nervous breath and tried to speak.

"Nik I-" he began but he felt his lips close without his permission. He felt his limbs stiffen a little too, unable to move them as he saw her look up to him, her eyes glowing an even brighter cold blue than usual. Her right hand wound back and when it came forward she slapped him across the cheek as hard as she could before letting go of her hold on him. He stumbled to his side and cupped his cheek, gritting his teeth to try and keep from yelping in pain. He looked back to her and saw her shaking her hand in the air as if it had hurt her as well.

And like that, she turned and walked back to her room and he heard as she began rummaging through her belongings. He sucked in a deep breath and walked to her bedroom door, intending to look inside but when he got there he found her nude, getting ready to pull on a new set of clothes.

As she noticed his presence she walked to the door and he put his hands up to defend himself from her advance but was surprised when all she did was slam the door in his face. He was left alone and blinking in disbelief in the living room outside her door.

Inside her room, Nikki filled her satchel bag with a change of clothes before pulling on a t-shirt she had stolen from Thorn and one of his hoodies as well before she found a pair of socks and panties and covered them with one of her many pairs of black leggings and then a pair of cut off short jean shorts. She then grabbed her cell phone and charger from the wall beside her bed and shoved that in as well. Nikki moved to the mirror which she had hung on the back of the door and glamoured away her horns and tried to whiten up her skin as fast as she could before she ripped the door open.

Thorn was still standing there and as he moved to speak she pushed past him and headed for the bathroom. She scooped up a few toiletries and shoved them into her bag before turning around again to find Thorn behind her in the doorway.

"Nikki I'm so-" he began before again he felt his lips zip shut as she waved her hand at him.

"Move or I'll move you," she threatened but he didn't budge. When he didn't she shoved her weight into his chest with her shoulder and he let go of the door frame and she snuck past him and dropped her small hold over him. As she made it to the door of the apartment she felt his hand on her wrist and she, against her better judgment, hesitated.

"Nick please," she could hear the sorrow in his voice but this was no time to go easy on him. He'd treated her like shit for weeks and she couldn't let him get away with it, no matter how much she wanted to stay.

"Let go of me," she said softly, her voice cracking as she fought back tears. "Don't make me enchant you to do it," she threatened when he didn't let go.

At that though, his grip loosened and she wrenched free. She opened the door and again, hesitated in the doorway before turning to face him. She hadn't wanted to look at him but when she did she found him looking at her with sorrow drenching his face. No tears, but she could tell he knew how badly he'd fucked up and at that moment, all she wanted to do was leave. Unfortunately, her mouth had other ideas. The small part of her that liked to make trouble and loved to play with her food.

"And you're stupid enough to wonder why Anya fucking left you," she spat out and shook her head in disbelief. "Don't follow me," was all she said after that, not even sticking around to see if her insult had elicited a reaction. She was out the door and she flung it shut behind her. As she went down the stairs in a hurry though she was stopped by the sudden sound of what she could only guess was Thorn's fist smashing through the drywall of the kitchen. Moments later she was out in the cold and walking through the snow down the road. She headed down over the train tracks and to the library down the street.

It was the only bus stop around and as her butt hit the bench she put her face in her hands. She then pulled the collar of his hoodie up and over her face before screaming incoherently into the fabric to dull the noise. The cold of the night bit at her fingertips and her nose and ears but she wasn't about to go back. She'd wait here on the bench for this bus all night if she had to.

She looked up at the clock inside the small sheltered stop before looking to the bus schedule. She needed to get on the Hartford or New London Bus so she could get on the train. She had tried her best to not spend too much of the cash she had left from her parents and she figured she must have enough to get her to New York. She didn't have anybody to talk to in the world other than Val and so that's where she would go.

She pulled her phone up from her bag and checked the time, four-thirty in the morning. Still dark and she had a notification that it may start to snow soon. She checked back up to the notice board again and sighed. Only half an hour till the first bus for Hartford for the day arrived.

All she could do now was wait. She wiped her cheeks on her sleeves, finding partially frozen tears flake off of her cheeks as the fabric swept them off of her. She pulled up the hood of his sweater and leaned her head gently into the plexiglass cover of the bench and waited in silence, thankful that for once her thoughts seemed to be leaving her in silence in the cold and dark night.

/

Nicole squinted harshly as the bus bounced over a bump in the road and the sun caught her tired eyes. Her head was leaned into the window where she had temporarily fallen back asleep in the waning hours of darkness. As she straightened up and looked out over the road she realized they were off the highway. She figured they must be close to the train station now. She'd pulled a pair of mittens and a hat from her bag when she sat down and done the very best she could to cover most of her skin, even wrapping a scarf around most of her face so that only her eyes and a few stray strands of blonde hair poked out. It had helped her breathe on the bus. For the first few stops, there hadn't been many passengers so she'd been able to keep her window cracked but after a while, she'd felt bad for the people filing in.

Still, it hadn't been too nauseating. Shed grabbed a seat in the middle of the bus, as far away from the engine and the exhaust as possible. It certainly wasn't as bad as Thorn's stupid pipsqueak of a car. She did have a headache but it could be a lot worse.

She'd tried to keep herself occupied with how she was going to explain herself to Val for showing up unannounced. This way she wouldn't have to think about how hurt she must have made Thorn with her words and quick exit. She hadn't even told him where she was going and she'd ordered him to not follow her. She wasn't sure how long the magic would last on him but she did know that he was experienced with faeries. He could break the enchantment himself if he really wanted to.

Any normal person would stay enchanted for days or even weeks if a faerie glamoured them like that. She just needed a head start to get away from him and clear her head. It served him right anyway. He deserved to worry about her and not know if she was okay, didn't he? It's not like they were together anyway. Two loners living in the same apartment. Why would they need to be more connected than that? 'We've only saved each other's lives,' she silently reasoned before realizing how stupid that sounded.

When the bus stopped she got off and walked inside the train station before rushing up to the counter. She ripped her wallet from her bag and shoved money through the ticket window, "first train to New York," she said, trying to hustle the conversation along so she wouldn't need to pull the scarf down. As she was handed her change and her ticket she turned and read the time on the card. She had ten minutes to spare and with it, she headed right to the Dunkin Doughnuts inside the station and bought a coffee and breakfast wrap before she rushed to the bathroom.

She touched up her glamour here and there where she thought she'd needed to and relieved herself before heading up and onto her platform. The train was already there and she was ushered on almost immediately. When she got inside she huffed in surprise. "Fucking cheapskate," she breathed out as she looked around.

The train car was, to her shock, completely metal-free. Plastic benches lined with cushions and topped with rubber handrails. Even the luggage racks were wooden and the lights were dimmed a little to accommodate the time of day. As she chose a seat away from anyone else she finished her thought.

"The train is a giant metal tube on wheels," she mocked. "Dickhead," she shook her head as she pulled her scarf down and drank in the startlingly clean air and heat of the coach.

She settled in and as the train began to set off she felt her phone vibrate. 'Don't answer it,' she thought to herself sternly. It was just a text, based on the single vibration, but she still didn't want to talk to Thorn. After a minute though she couldn't resist pulling out her phone only to find that it wasn't Thorn. When Val had come over the girls had exchanged numbers and it was that name that the text belonged to.

'Nikki? Are you safe?' was what it read. She ground her teeth together and looked up into the ceiling for a moment, annoyed that Thorn had asked Val to talk to her for him.

'Don't play messenger for Thorn,' she typed back and sent.

'I just want to know if you're safe.'

'I'm fine. Don't tell him that but I'm fine.'

'Alright...Do you need anything?' she read and found herself a little shocked that Val cared enough to answer. They had been friendly but she hadn't expected them to become close. She'd never had a friend that cared enough to ask her if she was truly okay before.

'Call me?' she typed back slowly before sending the message and waiting to see if Val would actually do it. Her eyes lit up and she even jumped a little as the phone began to ring. She accepted the call and pressed the phone to her ear. "Tell me you won't tell Thorn what we talk about…" she said before Val could even say hello.

She heard Val hesitate for a moment before she spoke, "I promise," she said softly. "Are you really okay?" Her voice sounded so soft. So gentle and caring and Nikki almost thought she might be talking to someone else.

Nikki found herself hesitating again and she felt sparks on her tongue. She'd come to know this sensation as her body rejecting the notion of lying. "No," she sighed in defeat.

"Well, where are you?"

"I'm on the train...headed to New York. I should be there in a few hours…" she said softly, not sure how else to explain that she had planned on dropping in on Val.

Val was silent for a moment before speaking, "I'll make some room for you. You can stay…" she began before she suddenly stopped.

"Val? You there?" She asked, breaking the silence.

"Stay with Ruth and Hazel," she cleared her throat and Nikki got the distinct impression that that wasn't what she had intended to say.

"Ruth?" Was all Nikki could manage. They had talked about a few things during Val's visit but a girl named Ruth was not one of those things.

"She's my best friend," she heard some of the happiness come back into Val's voice.

"I thought Hazel was your best friend," Nikki contemplated.

"No, Hazel is my work partner, who happens to be dating my best friend," she explained with lightheartedness in her voice.

"Well, I...I wouldn't want to inconvenience them or...cause trouble," Nikki admitted, fully aware of how badly she had been aching for the touch of another's flesh lately. "I can't stay with you?"

"You...Nikki you might not be comfortable staying...with me and...with us."

"Uncomfortable?" She asked, curiosity lighting up her face. "Who is us?"

"I'll uhmmm...I'll pick you up at the train station okay? I'll explain when you get here. Tell me when you're close okay?"

"Alright…" she breathed back.

"Oh and...when you get off the train try to hold your breath. I'll have something for you but it's gonna be a really shitty time for you getting out of Grand Central…"

"I've been to Grand Central before you know?" She replied with condescension.

"As a human...yes," she replied and Nikki began to realize what she meant.

"Oh...fuuucckkk," she groaned.

"Like I said just try to bear it for a few minutes I've got something for the iron sickness I can give you."

"Really?" She said as she sat up in her seat.

"Don't get your hopes too high. It's not gonna make it go away just...make it a little more bearable."

"Okay well...I guess I'll text you when they say we are almost there."

"Okay. Be safe," Val encouraged.

"Thank you," she replied before saying it again. "Thanks, for...being there Val," she smiled.

"You're welcome," Val actually chuckled a little. "See you in a bit," she finished before hanging up. Nikki placed her phone down in her lap and smiled before laying her head against the window.

"What a nice girl."


	3. Chapter 2

I've been acting like I'm strong

But the truth is, I've been losing ground

To a hospital too crowded,

A summer winding down

I hadn't seen a heartbreak until now

I hadn't felt a heartbreak until now

-The Wonder Years, Dismantling Summer

Chapter Two

Grand Central Station is one of the largest and most efficient Train Stations in the world. Its network of tunnels and platforms is absolutely massive and over the decades has been added to endlessly. It's caverns of track stretch for miles before trains see the light of day again.

It is also quite possibly the worst place on Earth for a faerie to be. The entire system of tunnels and every platform is stuffed full of iron and fumes. Every poison a faerie could ever have the misfortune of ingesting, packed neatly under a single roof. As soon as her coach had passed under the first tunnel Nikki had begun to feel a small buzzing in her head. As they went deeper and deeper into the system of tunnels the buzz became a dull throb, like she'd had her head pressed up against one of the fluorescent lightbulbs that flashed in a trance-inducing strobe in the tunnel.

Soon she found herself digging her nails into her scalp, eyes fixed on the seat in front of her without really meaning to do so. By the time the train came to a stop she was already dizzy and when the doors opened the rancid air of the underground station flooded the car. Nikki barely kept down her breakfast. She staggered to her feet and trudged out onto the platform, the soles of her winter boots dragging across the concrete platform.

Her throat burned first, only to be shortly followed by her lungs. This place was poison. She began to cough and the people around her began to look the other way and avoid coming close to her.

She was lucky she'd sent Val a text before getting into the tunnels because when she pulled her phone out to check for any new messages she saw she had no service. But as she looked around the platform she couldn't see Val anywhere.

The entire building was barely lit, and she counted herself lucky that she could see in the dark. She stumbled toward the exit, a long walk when you can barely breathe, and tried to see if Val had gone to the wrong platform. Instead, as she reached the end of her platform and the exit came into view she saw Val standing there behind the turnstiles.

'Of course, she can't come out here without a ticket,' Nikki's air starved brain groaned. She shuffled her way slowly toward Val but her vision was swimming. She felt more and more sick by the second.

She could barely hear the crowd around her. She let her vision fall to the concrete floor and soon her hands and knees followed as she began to choke and gag.

She tried to look back up to Val. She was only twenty feet or so away but she couldn't hear her at all now. Val looked like she was shouting something to the guard that was posted at the turnstiles to keep people from sneaking in. Val was pointing at Nikki and gesturing down to a small bottle in her hand, and she saw the guard turn around and look down at Nikki.

After a few more moments of shouting the guard came over to her and she felt him lift her to her feet and he began talking but it was far too faint to make out. He carried her to the turnstiles and he and Val pushed and pulled her through before Val started hauling her through the crowd until they had a moment to stop.

Val spoke again as she held up the small glass bottle but Nikki couldn't make it out. She could hardly see Val anymore she had been choking for so long. Darkness had so completely crept in around the edges of her vision that Val looked like nothing more than a blend of colors against a grey backdrop. Soon the bottle was at her lips and she was absent-mindedly drinking whatever it was that Val was feeding her.

It tasted downright awful. Like those cheap flavoring packets that people dumped into bottles of water and shook up when they couldn't be bothered to buy flavored water. But tasting the liquid was something Nikki hadn't expected. It was the first of her senses that began to return to her and ground her back to where she was. Her eyes snapped open and Val ripped the bottle away from her lips. Nikki's vision began to slow down and she felt a little better, but could still feel the iron in her slightly deeper breaths. Then they were moving again, Val leading the way up and onto the first floor and eventually out onto the street. Once there Nikki fell to her knees and began to breathe in as deeply as her body would let her before she could no longer hold it in.

She gagged one more time before her breakfast decided it would rather be on the sidewalk than inside of her stomach. She felt a hand at her back and she tried her best to take deep breaths of the, mostly, fresh air as Val's fingers worked up and down. When she turned her head she found Val crouching down beside her and was thankful for her intervention. "You save me again," Nikki coughed with what she hoped was a smile. Val smiled down to her before offering her a hand. She took it and was pulled to her feet.

Now that she could focus, she noted that Val's attire was very different than she'd seen it so far. A black beanie with the ends of her bobbed red hair sticking out, winged eyeliner, a black winter coat, and black skinny jeans with a pair of winter boots. Startlingly normal looking for what Nikki had come to expect from the red-headed woman. "Sorry I wasn't there, that dickheaded guard wouldn't let me in."

"What was that stuff you gave me?" Nikki wondered aloud as Val began leading her down the sidewalk, hand in hand.

"It staves off Iron sickness," Val explained. "Well for faeries anyway. My husband makes it," she smiled.

"Husband?" Nikki blinked, focusing on the wrong part of the sentence. "You're married?"

"That's what I need to talk to you about...let's go get some coffee alright?"

"Uhm...okay," she shrugged, not quite sure that she was ready to hear everything that Val had to say.

A few blocks, and some uncomfortable silence later, they arrived outside Moon in a Cup and as soon as Val opened the door Nikki's mood soured. Kate was at the counter and as soon as she turned to greet them she frowned at who had walked in her door.

Before welcoming them she turned back to her current customer and ignored the two girls as they got in line. "Aren't you hot in all of that?" Val asked as they waited.

"I'm not very good at glamouring myself," she whispered back.

"Once we have our coffee we can go back to my office and you can get comfortable."

"Why're you so fuckin nice," Nikki laughed out shortly. "Really weird having a friend."

"Yeah well, you're used to living with an emotionally unstable wolfman so anything would look nice next to him."

"I guess you're right…"

Once they had their orders, including a new breakfast for Nikki, the girls went back into the corridor and once they'd reached the door with the glass sign which read, 'Blade Twins,' Val produced a key from her pocket and opened the door.

Inside Nikki found an office much like Kaye's, though far cleaner. It had collectibles all over as well but they were much more organized and very different from the Pixie's. Video game character action figures and posters mostly, with a desk and a much beefier computer than Kaye's, which had video game stickers plastered all over the tower.

"It's so clean," was all Nikki could say as she took a seat on the other side of the table from Val's computer chair. Val took a seat too and Nikki pulled back her hood before she tossed her mittens and bag into the seat beside her. Nikki let her glamour drop and she ran her fingers through her long platinum hair, careful to work around her horns as she had learned to do over the past month of having them.

"Compared to Kaye's office a dumpster is clean," she snorted in return. "She's always been like that. An organized mess. If her office was clean she'd never find anything she needed."

"I can...kinda relate to that honestly," Nikki smiled shyly as she thought of how her own bedroom had been at her parents. Clothes were strewn about the entire room that were clean and dirty, and only she knew which piles were which. "Anyway...what did you wanna talk to me about?"

"Well about you and Thorn and...about why you might not be comfortable staying with us…"

"Can we start there I...really don't wanna talk about Thorn right now…"

"Sure yeah that's fine," she said a little too quickly before downing a large gulp of her coffee. Nikki could easily tell she was nervous. She was tapping her fingers on her desk and she could hear her leg bouncing up and down under her desk. "Sooooo my...husband is...not human," she said softly, clearly dancing around the words she wanted to say.

That wasn't too surprising. Nikki figured that that was a possibility and she didn't really understand why Val was so nervous to tell her. "Okay? And why would that make me uncomfortable?"

"Because he...Ravus is...a…trollll," she hung on the word for a long time and Val watched nervously as Nikki's face changed from curiosity to almost showing a bit of fear.

"Oh," was all she could manage to breathe out.

Val's face scrunched up as she rested her chin into her right hand, elbow on the desk for support. "Yyeaaahhh," she breathed out.

"Well...is he...like...nice?" Nikki struggled to find the word she wanted to use. Grabby. Douchey? Rapey? She didn't feel right calling someone else any of those things because lately, she'd felt like those words applied to her just as much as the Troll she'd…'murdered,' the voice in her head rang out again before she closed her eyes and shook the thoughts out of her head. She grabbed her coffee and took a long drink before Val replied.

"He's actually very sweet," Nikki watched as Val smiled to herself, seeming to relax, happy that Nikki had asked rather than saying no right away. "He made that drink for you like I said. He makes it for a lot of the solitary fey in the city so they can live mostly comfortably."

"Well that is...nice," Nikki answered with a small smile. "How did you end up dating a troll?" Nikki smirked.

"It's a really...long story," Val smiled shyly as she pulled off her own beanie and tucked some stray red hairs behind her ear. She really was beautiful, Nikki thought. Traditionally pretty. Nikki could see that she wore almost no makeup, just cover up and eyeliner and even then it wasn't much. Her green eyes and red hair clashed perfectly and the way she cut it was so bold for someone of Val's age. Nikki had seen that haircut on many a teenager in her life but never someone who was nearly thirty.

Val had revealed her age to Nikki when she'd visited the apartment and Nikki had been shocked to think that she could really be that much older than her. "We've been together for over ten years now," she smiled softly before reaching for a picture frame on her desk.

She turned it around to reveal a picture of herself, a man with oil black hair and greens skin with fangs protruding past his lower lip and a small green-skinned child between them. The man's eyes with flecked with gold but the child's were decidedly green like Val's.

"Wait you...is that your son?" Nikki gasped as she took the picture from Val and the older girl laughed.

"Yep. Turns four this year," Val smiled as she watched Nikki study the photo. The man was much smaller than the troll that she'd fought. He was even borderline lanky and his skin wasn't nearly as green as she'd expected. "Ravus is only half-troll," Val explained when she saw Nikki's confused expression. "The baby is a quarter," she smirked.

"I didn't think faeries and humans could…" she paused, looking for the most appropriate word, "be together like this…"

"Faeries actually seek human mates more than you'd think. It's extremely rare for a pair of faeries to become pregnant so more often than not they'll have a human carry their offspring. Half the time they leave them to be raised with humans as changelings too so they don't have to deal with it."

"Like Kaye?" Nikki's head shot up from the photo.

"Yep," Val smiled.

"So Ravus he...he chose you?"

That made Val laugh and Nikki was thankful that she'd lightened the mood some more, even though she hadn't been joking. "No no...I chose him," Val smiled sweetly before taking the picture back and standing it back on her desk. "I got in some seriously deep shit when we first met and that led me to him. Saved his life by winning a duel with a faerie and told him I cared about him. Never regretted it for a second."

Nikki couldn't help but smile. "Too bad Thorn isn't romantic like that…"

Val chuckled softly before she took another swig of coffee. "He was."

Nikki's attention returned to Val and she found her twiddling her thumbs on the desk. "Before Anya…" Nikki grumbled.

"Anya and Thorn they...we all really thought that they were gonna go the distance ya know?" Val admitted and Nikki sulked. "Thorn obviously thought the same because he was completely blown away when he woke up one morning and she was gone. I haven't known him for more than the past few years but it really seemed like she was his only serious relationship."

"So what I should let his bullshit slide and keep trying?" Nikki scoffed.

"That's not what I'm saying I'm just...he might still have some sliver of hope that this is all just a really shitty dream or something...like one of these days he's gonna wake up and Anya will be there singing to him just like she used to…"

"What's his deal Val...he won't talk to me or tell me anything. I didn't press the matter last time but I need to know now. Why's he such a jerk? What made him love her so much? I know you said it's not your place but I need to know and he won't tell me…"

Val heaved a long sigh and ran both her hands through her hair. "Thorn...lost his pack…"

'Oh here it comes...shouldn't have asked,' Nikki thought to herself. Val had barely even begun to explain and Nikki could already feel her throat closing up with sorrow.

"When he got out of high school his pack had a territory dispute with a faerie court and they were all slaughtered except for Thorn. He wasn't there because his parents hadn't told him. They probably wanted him to stay out of it and stay safe. No other pack would take him in because they say he is disgraced by not fighting to the death with his own pack."

"He's...that's stupid!"

All Val could do was shrug. "That's how it is. Thorn started doing any jobs he could to support himself and once he was eighteen he ditched the distant family he was staying with and that's really all I know before he showed up here."

"When he...saved someone you cared about," Nikki said as her jaw dropped and she looked back to the picture.

"Trevor," Val smiled again and nodded toward the photo. "That was after he saved Ruth from the mugger. She bought him a coffee and introduced us. We actually were really good friends for a couple of years. But when he asked for some space after Anya left I didn't think he meant THIS much space…"

"Val that's all well and good but…"

"I'm not asking you to wait forever for him to change I'm just…" Val explained quietly before taking a pause. "I'm just saying that you two could really be good for eachother...you know what it is to be alone. Give him another chance to prove it...You both deserve to be happy and I think you might be…"

"I don't want to see him...nevermind talk to him," Nikki folded her arms over her chest and sulked back in her chair. "Can it wait?"

"Like I said. You can stay a few days if you want to. We have space," Val smiled.

"Did you tell him I was coming?"

"No. I just told him you were safe but he's not an idiot. If I know you're safe that means I talked to you and if I talked to you that means you are comfortable with me. He'll be on his way I'm sure."

"Ugh," Nikki groaned as she threw her head back and stared up at the ceiling. "He better have a damn good apology on his stupid...delici-" Nikki began to say before she shook the creeping desire from her mind, "lips…"

Nikki heard Val laugh a little before she stood and walked around the table to where Nikki sat and held a hand out to her. Nikki took her hand and Val pulled her to her feet. "Come on," she smiled and Nikki followed her out and into the hallway, waiting so Val could lock the door to her office. "I'll show you the place." Nikki did her best to replace her glamour and hoped it was convincing enough to keep them out of trouble.

Val let her out of the coffee shop and out onto the sidewalk. "Ya know you guys seemed fine when I came to visit?" Val pointed out as they walked the cold city streets, pushing through crowds of people when necessary.

"Well, we WERE fine when you came to visit…" Nikki replied. "He was fine for a week or two when I first moved in but we've just been miserable since then...he keeps pushing me away and...he can't sleep."

"Sounds like Thorn...Any ideas why?" Val asked, raising an eyebrow.

"He keeps having nightmares and he...can't seem to get comfortable...I think it's because he...doesn't trust me…" she sighed as she wrapped her arms around herself again.

"Doesn't trust you? You saved his life? What more does he need!?" Val laughed.

"I know!" Nikki yelled a little too loud before quieting down, trying not to grab anyone's attention. "I know...we...I really thought that that night in the cabin we…" she trailed off.

"Wait," Val gave her a questioning glance. "Night in the cabin?"

"The night before you guys found me in the snow…" Nikki tried to explain. "When I found out I was a...well...you know...he told me that we are...needy," she danced around the words 'hypersexual,' for the sake of the people around them.

"Needy like…" Val began before she subtly thrust her hips forward and Nikki couldn't help but laugh a little.

"Yes like that...the night in his apartment before we came to New York was hell. I tried to seduce him all night until he finally got me to go to bed and then on the way up to Maine I kissed him and...more than that even though I knew he didn't want me to...then the night in the cabin after he pulled me out of the lake we…"

"Did the dirty," Val smirked and Nikki elbowed her gently in the hip.

"Yes!" She growled out. "I was afraid that I'd enchanted him to want me but then when we got him back home he told me that I hadn't. I thought we were going to be together but then it's like...he just put his guard back up. In the beginning, when he'd wake up from a nightmare I'd be there to comfort him back to sleep but after a few times, he told me to stop. We haven't kissed or...anything since that first day being back and I...I don't know how much longer I can wait…"

"It's that bad?" Val asked, a little shocked. Nikki followed her as she broke off down another street and looked up to find that the Manhattan bridge stood tall before then. "I know the folk are more sexually oriented than humans but are you struggling more than that?"

"Thorn said it had to do with what kind of Faerie I am," she sighed. "That dark-skinned elves have stronger desires than others. I even glamoured a guy to look like Thorn so I could make out with him and...I glamoured that Troll to look like Thorn too so I could tolerate the way he was touching me at the revel...and in the heat of the moment I...failed to notice the difference."

Val was silent for a long moment as she tried to think of an appropriate response. "Do you think that's why he doesn't trust you?

"Well that was before he supposedly let his guard down and we...slept together in the cabin so no...I don't think so. I think he just regrets letting me stay...and sleeping with me and just...everything. I think he's still waiting for Anya to come home and he feels bad for betraying her or something stupid like that…"

"Hmmm, I guess I'd yell at him and walk out too," Val smirked a little. "I'd tell you to confront him instead of running away from your problems but...I don't get to tell people that," she shrugged and Nikki couldn't help but ask.

"Why not?" She asked as Val led her down and off the road into an abandoned industrial lot.

"New York's a really good place to go when you're running from your problems," was all she said, giving Nikki another gentle smile. Nikki looked up and found that they were now beneath the hulking metal bridge. She could feel the iron swinging in the wind hundreds of feet above them.

"Where are we going exactly?" She breathed out.

"Up there," Val gestured with her chin as they came to a door on a cement maintenance building. She opened it up and held it for Nikki to pass through.

"You...live here?" She smirked, absentmindedly thinking out loud. "Trolls under a bridge?"

Val laughed and walked in behind Nikki and let the door swing shut. "Trolls under the bridge," she confirmed as she took the lead and brought Nikki up several flights of stairs until they reached the top. "Sorry if it's a mess, I didn't expect company," she shrugged and Nikki laughed.

"You should see the apartment. Can't be worse than that."

Val opened the door and Nikki's lips parted as she took in the sights. There were jars full of plant life all over the room, cluttered shelves, and a workbench in the corner of the room. There were also stacks of papers and books strewn all over the room which, despite it being bright outside today, was only lit by candles and lanterns. There were windows, but they had been covered over with thick blackout curtains.

Past the work area, there seemed to be a small dining table before a doorway led into what looked to be a small kitchen. The kitchen seemed much less improvised than the front room though like it didn't match the rest of the space. It had a tile floor and even had an actual light in the ceiling and a full range of appliances and Nikki noted that all the handles on them were plastic.

"Wow," Nikki marveled. "How did this all get up here?" She asked as Val shut the door. Before she could speak Nikki heard footsteps coming from around a corner before the kitchen. She froze when the troll from the picture on Val's desk came around said corner, wiping his eyes into his sleeve, wearing quite possibly an even crappier glamour than she was.

"Val?" His rough raspy voice groaned out as he continued to wipe the sleep from his eyes. "You're home early. Who's your friend?"

Nikki watched as Val crossed the room and gently threw her arms around the man and Nikki couldn't help but notice how tall and well built Val really was. The troll was taller than both of them, obviously, but as she stretched up on the tips of her boots and draped her arms across his shoulders you could hardly notice the difference.

He was covered in mostly human clothes as well, like he'd thrown something on along with his glamour to try and fool whomever Val had brought into their home. Nikki was relieved when he held Val back and couldn't help but notice how incredibly gentle he was. Val pecked him on the cheek for a moment before she let him go. "Ravus this," she turned back and pointed to Nicole, "is Nikki. Thorn's...roommate," Val shrugged and Nikki couldn't help but laugh. "Nikki this is my husband, Ravus," she smiled.

"Pleasure to meet you then," she watched as he smiled and, though he didn't much resemble the troll she'd had her run-in with, Nikki felt a shiver run down her spine as she saw his teeth peek through his lips.

"You...as well," she struggled to get out before she shook her head and looked to the floor. "Sorry," she breathed out.

"For?" He asked as Val stripped off her heavy coat and put in on a rack by the corner of the room.

"She's had bad experiences with trolls," Val said nonchalantly and Nikki looked back up.

"We can be quite the unpleasant bunch," Ravus admitted and walked to his desk. "May I assume that this is who the potion was for this morning?"

"Yep," Val nodded and watched as Ravus took a seat at his desk. "Trevor still asleep?"

"He is," Ravus turned back to Val and Nikki watched as he smiled that strange and gentle smile another time. She couldn't deny that under all of his more wicked features, his expression almost looked soft. His expression turned more curious though as he squinted his gold-flecked eyes as Nikki. "You seem familiar somehow."

Val looked back to Nikki to see what he meant and after a moment she remembered where Nikki's amulet had come from. Val's mood soured quickly and she closed her eyes, smacking herself in the face softly as she realized what she had failed to tell Ravus before inviting Nikki over.

"Nikki is...Nicnevin's daughter…"


	4. Chapter 3

Found you when your heart was broke

I filled your cup until it overflowed

Took it so far to keep you close

I was afraid to leave you on your own

I said I'd catch you if you fall

And if they laugh then fuck'em all

And then I got you off your knees

Put you right back on your feet

Just so you could take advantage of me

-Halsey, Without Me

Chapter Three

"May I assume that there is a good reason that you've invited a threat into our home?" Ravus asked dryly. Nikki could see that despite his calm expression his nails were dragging heavily through the wood of his desk. Had Val told him what she'd done at the court of Teeth? Did he really consider her a threat to himself because of it? Or did the name of her mother really carry that much baggage with it?

"I didn't," Val sighed and held her hand out to Nikki who accepted it nervously. Val began to lead her through the house but Ravus couldn't help but speak up.

"Valarie are you enchanted?" He asked skeptically and while Nikki did understand why he'd asked she felt the need to defend herself.

"No I swear I didn't enchant her," she said softly.

"See? Can't lie right?" Val smiled when Ravus rolled his eyes and turn back to his desk.

"Yes yes fine," he waved his hand absently as the pair saw him begin to shuffle through some of the documents on his desk. As the girls moved through to the kitchen Val gestured to the kitchen table for Nikki to sit down. Val rifled through the refrigerator quickly and came up with a set of sodas in glass bottles and set them down at the table before she took a seat next to Val and pulled her phone from her pocket.

"Valarie huh?" Nikki smirked.

"Yeah yeah laugh it up," Val smirked to herself. "We can't all have pretty faerie names," she stuck out her tongue. "Well we've got all day and more than likely Ravus will be going back to sleep soon. Wanna see if anyone wants to come hang out?" Val offered as Nikki wrapped her shirt around her fingers and pulled the twist-off bottle cap away from the bottle. "Shit sorry I forgot you can't touch bottle caps," she sighed.

"It's fine, I got it," Nikki smiled and dropped the cap on the table. "Thank you though. And I mean if you wanna invite people over then go ahead man it's your house, not mine," she smirked.

"I'll see who's up."

"So you said Ravus makes potions and stuff for the solitary Fae. Does he work at night or something?"

"Yep," Val nodded as she typed up a text and rifled it off to Ruth and turned her attention to her soda. "Trolls turn to stone in the sunlight so they really only come out at night. Sleep all day. The coffee shop is open twenty-four hours and we mostly only get Fae customers after dark."

"Ohhhhh," Nikki sighed. "Am I keeping you from work right now?"

"No not at all," Val smiled. "Hazel and I take Mondays off."

"You and Hazel huh?" She mumbled. "Are you two sisters or something cus you look...crazy similar," Nikki stressed.

Val laughed a little before answering. "No. We are actually Doppelgangers."

"Uhm….what?" Nikki blinked in confusion.

"Ahah. Doppelgangers. So you know how Kaye and Kate are right?"

"Kaye is a changeling. She was swapped with Kate at a young age and someone put a glamour on her to look like Kate."

"Right. So Doppelgangers are even more similar than a glamoured changeling. Hazel and I were born at the same time, on the same day, same year, same everything, but from two different families. Completely human families to be specific. We are more or less genetically the same. Same voice, same face, and body, stuff like that. We just grew up completely differently because obviously, we didn't know each other."

"Ooohhkayyyyy," Nikki tried to wrap her head around the idea. "Then how did you find each other?"

"One day Ravus and I were moving an old enchanted mirror at the Court of Termites and I saw myself in it, but my reflection wasn't doing what I was doing. We were studying each other. We reached our hands out and I pulled Hazel through the mirror from where she was looking through one too. Back in Fairfold, her hometown."

"You...pulled her through a mirror," Nikki said in disbelief. "Did you spike your coffee when I wasn't looking?"

Val laughed off her question before she continued. "No. I'm serious. Believe me, it was pretty weird to me too. That was years ago. Fairfold is a human town that lives very close to a large faerie settlement and they do interact. The people who live there know that faeries exist. Hazel had become a knight in the local Kings court but when she found herself with us in New York she fell in love with the city. Not to mention," she began but was interrupted by a ding from her cell phone. "Ruth," she smirked.

"So wait your best friend is dating a woman that looks just like you?"

"YEP," Val sighed heavily. "It's...pretty fuckin weird" she shrugged.

"How long has that been happening?"

"Eh...like five years or something close to that. They are good for each other don't get me wrong it's just...awkward when you get mistaken for your best friend's girlfriend in the dark," Val laughed nervously.

Nikki sucked a breath through her gritted teeth in response, "oof yeah I bet," she laughed.

"Anyway, they said they'd be here in a bit."

"Cool," Nikki commented offhandedly before taking another glance around the room. "How DID this all get up here?"

"Well, everything but the kitchen was already here when I met Ravus. He says it's a maintenance workers area for when the bridge needs repairs but it was out of use when he found it. When I moved in we glamoured some contractors to come in and add a kitchen to the space so I could stop eating take out three meals a day," she laughed. Val could see Nikki's expression turn glum though for a moment before she continued to explain. "Don't worry, we paid them," Val chuckled. "Pretty well actually. We just made them forget everything they saw and did. It was pretty disruptive for a while but it was worth it."

Nikki felt a smile creep back over her lips as her mood lightened back up. "I guess that's not so bad."

"You...don't like to glamour people huh?" Val discerned and watched as Nikki shrugged her shoulders a little.

"I just...It's not like it's not super convenient or anything cus it is...I'd probably be in a government facility being dissected right now if I couldn't glamour people I just...I don't like that I'm able to. Cus I can't control myself…"

"Cus you keep turning guys into Thorn by accident…" Val asked.

"Yeah...if I was human then none of this would have happened. You should have seen how nice he was to me when he thought I was a human girl...he was the sweetest guy I've ever met. I wish I had never changed…"

"I guess your life would be much easier if you hadn't changed but...that doesn't mean it'd be better you know? It's only been a month. You've got plenty of time to figure yourself out," Val smiled but Nikki saw as her lips drooped back down and her vision fell to the table.

"What's wrong?" Nikki asked.

"Gone in one faerie's sigh," Val said softly as she looked back out toward the living room. Nikki followed her eyes to where she saw Ravus standing and returning a few books to his shelves.

"Gone in...what?" She asked as she looked back to where Val sat. A small smile crept back over Val's lips as she spoke again.

"Nothing," she shook her head and brightened up. "I'm gonna get this place cleaned up a little bit before they show up okay?" She asked as she stood from her chair.

"I can help you," Nikki offered and Val held her hand out for Nikki to take.

"You are more than welcome to," she smiled.

By the time Hazel and Ruth showed up the house was nearly clean. They'd swept the concrete floors of all the rooms and we're careful to drop the dust out of a window that Ravus wasn't near enough to get caught in the sunlight. Most of his books had been replaced into the bookshelf as well and they were just finishing cleaning the countertop and dining table with wet rags when the pair came through the door.

Nikki looked up from her work in the kitchen to find Hazel leading the other woman through the doorway. Her hair was long and black with a white hombre towards the bottom. Pin straight as well and her eyeliner was winged far larger than Val's. Her lips too were painted black and she had what Nikki guessed had to be at least one-inch gauges in each of her earlobes. They appeared to be made of wood and had a carving in them that Nikki recognized as the same Oak tree that had been on Hazel's armor. She wore a black and red flannel, unbuttoned, over a black tank top. Lower than that she wore a plain black pair of jean shorts over a pair of black leggings with a pair of wedged, black leather boots to top it all off.

Nikki thought she looked incredible. She even found herself a bit jealous, and suddenly very conscious of the fact that she was half-dressed in Thorn's clothing, and her horns were on display. Hazel had a much simpler outfit on, and nearly no makeup to speak of. She wore a red, white and mostly blue hoodie with the word, 'Rangers,' running diagonally across the front of it and the number thirty-six on the sleeve in white, above a pair of blue jeans and a pair of very well used work boots.

As they came in and shut the door they were almost immediately greeted by Ravus and Val who had been in the front room already. Nikki watched as the new girl, Ruth she figured, threw her arms around Ravus with a big smile and Hazel and Val hugged as well.

Nikki folded her arms under her chest and looked to her shoes, rotating them on her heels for a moment before she heard Val say her name. She looked up to see Val coming toward her with her hand extended and took it shyly. "This is Nikki," she said as she led her into the living room to meet Ruth. When she got there she felt even more embarrassed than before when Ruth began to stare, slack-jawed at her horns. Ruth was a little taller than Nikki but she figured that that may only be due to the heels she was wearing. She was nowhere near as tall as Hazel or Val.

"Nice to...meet you," Nikki said shyly and stuck her hand out to Ruth. Ruth was so preoccupied with her horns though that she didn't notice until Val slapped her friend in the arm.

"Oh! Sorry hi!" Ruth said with a smile and took Nikki's hand in her own to shake. "Your horns are just so," she began and Nikki closed her eyes at the fear of what she would finish with. "Beautiful," Ruth said happily.

Nikki blinked in disbelief and all she could let out was a quiet and surprised, "thank you."

"You've got to let me paint you some time," Ruth said as she looked Nikki up and down, head to toe and Nikki began to wonder if Ruth was seeing something that the rest of them weren't.

"Aaaaand thank you, Ruth, for making this as awkward as possible," Val laughed and touched her hand on her best friend's shoulder.

"You're welcome, it's what I do," she smirked and stuck her tongue out at Val, only for Nikki to find out that her tongue was pierced as well.

"Anyway," Hazel cut in. "You girls wanna go get lunch or something? Wouldn't wanna wake the baby right?"

"Good point," Val conceded as she hadn't quite thought of it. "Nikki just ate thou-"

"It's fine," Nikki smiled as she stuffed her hands into the pouch of Thorn's sweater. "I can eat more," she shrugged.

"That's the spirit," Hazel smirked and held her hand out to Nikki in a fist. Nikki slowly realized what she wanted from her and pulled her right hand from the pouch and bumped her fist into Hazel's as she let out a shy smile.

"Alright well let me get my shit then," Val smiled and ran to the coat rack and pulled her coat back around herself and headed back to the door. "We'll be back at some point," she said softly as she went to Ravus and touched her hands to his green cheeks before she pressed her bright red lips to his rough black ones. "Should be in time to give Trevor breakfast so you shouldn't have to worry about that."

"Hmm," Ravus gave a brief smile. "Be safe," was all he replied before he sat back down at his desk.

"Always," Val sang before she pulled the door open and the four of them filed out. Once down on the street, they began the process of clueing Ruth in on how they knew Nikki. Hazel had, of course, explained the job they had gone to do and how they'd saved Thorn, but much of the details about Nikki herself had been left out.

"No wonder you seem so uncomfortable," was all that Ruth said finally after they had explained that Nikki had thought she was human up until a month ago.

"Is it that obvious," Nikki asked dryly as she stuffed her hands back into the pouch and returned her vision to the sidewalk.

"Yep," Hazel added in. Nikki had glamoured herself up as best she could while they had descended the staircase under the bridge and the group could mostly see what she had looked like as a human.

"Never met a changeling that hated returning to their natural state as much as you to be honest," Val thought out loud.

"You say that like you've met more than one other changeling," Hazel laughed and Val rolled her eyes.

"Okay yeah fair I guess but still, Kaye never seemed to hate her change."

"Where is Kaye anyway?" Nikki asked, suddenly reminded that this group had another strangely absent girlfriend. "I was hoping she could teach me to use my powers a little better," Nikki sulked but soon found that the rest of the girls were sulking as well. "What is it?" She asked.

"Kaye moved in with Roiben two weeks ago. Left the tea shop to Luis and Corney. She came home from that awful coronation and just packed her bags and left," Val sighed.

"I guess she'd been thinking about it for a while and I can't say I blame her. The two of them have been basically married for ten years now and they've lived a state away from each other the entire time. Sure the courts are dangerous but...she belongs there," Hazel mimicked her twins' tone.

"Roiben...Thorn said that name when we went to see Kaye about the necklace. Who is he?"

"Roiben is King of the Court of Termites. He was just a knight when they met but they've been inseparable since then.

"And this...coronation? That's what the Court of Teeth stole my necklace for right?"

"Right. Roiben and Kaye were there and it got really nasty really fast. They are lucky they got out of there alive, to be honest," Val answered.

"Ben said it was pretty gruesome yeah," Hazel added and Nikki gave her a strange look.

"That's an awfully mundane name for a faerie."

"Ahah," Hazel laughed. "He wishes. Ben is my brother. Consort of the Alder King Severin. King of the court from Fairfold," she explained after she gave her mocking tone to explain who Ben was.

"Ooohhhhkay you are all really deep in this shit aren't you," Nikki realized and the rest of them began to laugh.

"I think Hazel and Ruth and Corney and Luis may be the only human couples I know," Val said and Ruth finished her thoughts for her.

"And we're allllll gay," she smirked and Nikki couldn't help but laugh. Ruth slipped her hand down into Hazel's and twined their fingers together. "What are the odds," she shrugged with a smile.

"Hey some of us are Bi alright?" Hazel smirked and knocked her hip into Ruth's.

"Some?" Val laughed. "Literally only you," she pointed out.

As the group came to a street corner Val led them into a pizza place she had frequented for years. It was within a short walk of home and Moon in a Cup and she didn't have a car of her own. As they sat down and were given menus they struck their conversation back up. "So where's wolf boy anyway?" Hazel asked.

Nikki's mood quickly soured and Val scrunched up her face as she recalled that she'd forgotten to tell Hazel not to mention Thorn. "I'm sure he'll be here by the end of the day," Nikki said as their waitress came over to get their orders. After she'd scurried off behind the counter and out of earshot Nikki opened her mouth to continue but Val spoke first.

"Thorns being Thorn," she explained and Hazel gave a silent 'oh,' motion with her lips.

"Shocker," Ruth added as she lifted her eyebrows. "I swear that boy is trying to ruin his own life."

Nikki looked into Ruth's face and suddenly recalled what Val had mentioned to her. "Yeah well apparently it's just my fault so," she shrugged but Val rested her hand on top of her own on the table.

"Don't blame yourself," Ruth huffed and Nikki was a little surprised. "He's been a total dick since Anya ditched…" she sighed. "It's got nothing to do with you."

"He...saved you from a mugger right?" Nikki wondered out loud and Ruth nodded her head.

"Yep. Had me at gunpoint and everything. I had just left the tea shop after a long shift and I was alone. Easy target," she admitted. "Thorn just happened to be in the right place at the right time."

"Yeah, it sounds like he does that a lot…" Nikki sighed.

"It'll get better. Hell, thanks to you we actually saw him for the first time in months," Val encouraged. "You are breaking his armor, Nikki. It's just gonna take time till he's okay with that."

"Okay well, I shouldn't have to wait forever for that."

"But you COULD wait forever Nikki, that's the thing," Hazel stressed and Nikki gave her a questioning glance before Nikki's eyes opened wide in realization. She could, couldn't she? Nikki could wait decades for Thorn to come around if it came to it, maybe even centuries.

"Gone in one faerie's sigh," she whispered in disbelief. Val's grip tightened on her hand. "I forgot…" she gasped. How could she forget something like that? Nikki turned her attention to Val as the full meaning of her words crashed over her and Val tried to force a smile for Nikki.

"We can't afford to waste our time spinning our wheels but...you can Nikki."

"That's...that's not fair," Nikki choked on the words as she thought about the picture Val had shown her on her desk at the tea shop, about how she had kissed Ravus on their way out the door. "That's not fair!" She repeated as she felt tears welling in her eyes but she was shocked when Val pulled her into a hug from beside her in the booth.

"It's okay Nikki."

"No, it isn't!" She sobbed into Val's shoulder. "Why should I get to live forever when you don't!" Nikki knew what she was saying wasn't fair to Val but in the end, it was far more bearable to say then what she really wanted to say.

How on Earth was she going to live with Thorn, even if they were together? She wasn't going to age for decades, centuries even. One day she could wake up and find Thorn dead of old age and she would look no different than she did today.

Somehow, despite not being with him, that thought scared her far more than the fact that Val not only had a faerie for a husband, but also a faerie child that she would be leaving behind when her time came. Nikki felt Val's hand running up and down her back and she tried her best to stop the tears flowing down her face. She pulled back from the redhead and immediately stuffed her face into the sleeves of Thorn's hoodie to wipe her eyes dry, rather than soaking Val's shoulder.

"I'm sorry I'm just...this sucks...I hate it. I hate everything about being THIS," she sobbed and gestured to herself, "THING," She sighed in frustration.

"You're going through a rough time Nikki," Ruth said with a smile, "nobody could expect you to be okay with any of this right off the bat. Even Kaye had faerie friends when she was a little kid," She encouraged. "She always knew faeries existed, she just didn't know she was one too."

"This is a completely new world to you," Hazel confirmed. "Don't beat yourself up so much."

Nikki took a deep and shaky breath before she dropped her hands to the table again and reached for a napkin to blow her nose into. Once she had she crumpled it and set it down on their table and sighed, "thanks guys…" she whimpered.

"That's what friends are for," Val smiled and for a moment she thought Nikki may start crying again.

"Sorry sorry," she sniffled and shook her head, trying to bottle up her tears. "I've never had friends before," she explained softly.

"Like...never?" Ruth asked skeptically with a raised eyebrow.

"Never," Nikki breathed out before she felt her phone begin to vibrate. Their food arrived at their table along with their drinks as she fished it out from her the pouch of Thorn's sweater. She was lucky she had remembered to grab it since she'd left her bag in Val's… 'apartment?...house?' she thought to herself. 'Secret lair?' she thought and a small smirk crept across her lips, thankful that she'd found a way to cheer herself up.

When the screen lit up in her hands though, the smirk ran away from her lips and she dropped her phone onto the counter and the others watched it continue to vibrate as it slid slowly on the table and she turned her attention to her food. "You really are pissed at him huh?" Hazel chuckled and Nikki nodded with a mouth full of pizza.

Once she'd swallowed a large bite of it she spoke up and the phone stopped vibrating. "Fuck him," she said. "When he comes up with a good enough apology it better be in person."

"Well how's he supposed to find you if you don't answer the phone," Val smirked and Nikki froze for a moment.

"Hee'ssss got a good nose he'll figure it out...I think," she shrugged, not satisfied with her own answer. "At least let me play hard to get for a bit. He deserves it."

"That's fair," Val replied.

It was only seconds before Nikki had grabbed for her phone though and opened it to find a voicemail waiting for her. She pressed play and held the phone up to her ear for a moment and heard Thorn's voice for the first time since he'd grabbed her wrist. She was surprised at how much the sound burned her ears and was afraid if she listened too long she may feel bad enough to call him back.

"Nikki," the message began. "I'm...look I'm really sorry and...I wish I knew where you are so I could tell you but I know you probably don't want anything to do with me right now. I know you're probably with Val in New York and...well I'm around...but...I'll wait until you're ready to see me before I track you down. Take all the time you need but just one thing...whatever you do, don't go to t-" the voice began but was cut off by the girls making a little commotion and Nikki pulled the phone away from her ear as she felt something gently tugging at her hair.

"Val what the hell I'm trying to listen to-" she began but found herself dumbstruck at the sight of a tiny winged creature on her shoulder playing with her hair.

It was incredibly small, probably small enough to take a bath in a coffee mug and had small moth wings on its back and it had its fingers knotted in Nikki's hair while it hummed along to a tune. Nikki leaned away reflexively and hit her head on the window of the shop lightly.

"Hey hey it's okay," she felt Val grab her hand again and her eyes moved from the creature to Val and back to the little thing tangling her hair. "Lutie what are you doing here?" She asked the tiny thing and Nikki was shocked when it began to respond.

Her voice was so thin and shaky like if you blew on her she'd disappear like a dust bunny. "My King has asked me to come and ask you and Sir Hazel to come to the court right away. He has a request to make of you," she said quickly before looking back to Nikki. "Your hair is different Miss Ruth."

"Yo," Ruth chuckled and Lutie glanced over to the older woman. "Over here Lutie," she smirked and Lutie took several quick glances between Ruth and Nikki as her eyes slowly opened wider and wider. "NICNEVIN!" the small creature screamed before jumping from Nikki's shoulder and down to the table. She hopped to the end of the table and hid in Ruth's long black hair, peeking out from behind her stretched ear lobes nervously. "I'm sorry your majesty, I didn't mean to," she said, voice growing even shakier.

"Lutie, Lutie hey," Ruth said trying not to laugh at how her small hands and slippered feet tickled her neck. The last thing she wanted was to twitch and crush her between her neck and shoulder by accident. "It's okay," she said as she lifted a finger to her ear and Lutie grabbed hold of it. "She's not Nic-Nicne...whatever," Ruth shook her head and closed her eyes. "Ridiculous faerie names."

"You...are not Lady Nicnevin?" She breathed out shyly.

"No. Sorry for," she said before pausing and her own words flashed through her mind. 'Faeries don't apologize,' she thought before she felt a short wave of shame crash over her. "Sorry...No I'm not her. How can you even tell I look like her?" Nikki asked as she looked down to her own hands which were still decidedly white.

"Lutie can see through weak glamours," Val said before she looked back to Lutie. "So why does Roiben wanna talk to us huh?"

"He wants to trade favors," she let out softly and Nicole's face lit up in surprise.

"Well we better not keep the king waiting too long then," Val rolled her eyes.

"I'm sure he wouldn't mind if you finished eating," Lutie assured them as she hopped back down the table and jammed a tiny white finger into one of the slices of pizza and pulled up a bit of the melted cheese to snack on.

"Well I guess we'll head over after we're done then," Val sighed and looked to Nikki who was studying the small Sprite intently. "You gonna be good to hang out with Ruth when we go?"

"I...I can't go with you?" Nikki asked as she pried her eyes away from Lutie.

"It might not be...the best place for you to be," Hazel suggested.

"Why not? Kaye's there right? I'll just hang out with her," Nikki shrugged.

Val gave a long sigh before she picked up a slice of pizza, "Fine but you need to be careful alright? Don't go announcing who you are and try to keep your glamour up okay?" She asked.

"You got it, boss," Nikki smiled before digging back into her own food.


	5. Chapter 4

In my field of paper flowers

And candy clouds of lullaby

I lie inside myself for hours

And watch my purple sky fly over me

-Evanescence, Imaginary

Chapter Four

It wasn't too long of a ride on the bus back to Jersey and Nikki was surprised when she felt that it went by far too quickly. She'd been pretending she wasn't nervous about this little detour. After all, the last time she went to a faerie court Thorn almost died in her arms. Hazel and Val had insisted on stopping at their apartments to get their weapons just in case they needed them. "You never know," Val had shrugged and Hazel had agreed with her.

Nikki thought it may be a waste of time but it had given her the opportunity to grab her necklace from her bag and put on a much stronger glamour than the cruddy one she was struggling to wear at the pizza joint. The green of the stone shone in the sunlight that came in through the grimy bus windows. She looked positively human, except for the fact that her eyes still glowed an otherworldly, electric blue. Along the route, she began pointing out places she recognized and once they'd gotten within a few minutes of where she used to live she blinked in confusion.

"What town is this court in?" She asked quietly.

"Denville," Val answered. "Why?"

"No shit," Nikki breathed out before looking back out the window. "That's where I grew up…"

"That's where Kaye and Corny grew up too," Val huffed. "My mom lives right over the border too. Makes sense that you'd be born here, this IS where your...you know," she said, nodding to Nikki's necklace.

"Yeah I guess you're right I just...all this time," she sighed, cheek pressed against the glass. She let the rest of her realization go unsaid. Who would have ever known? Nothing ever really happened around here. Nothing serious anyway. Some girl older than Nikki had drowned when she was younger and a couple of other kids had gone missing around the same time but she'd never had any idea that had something to do with monsters.

When they hit their stop Val and Hazel led Nikki off the bus and she lifted the glamour she'd had to put on the driver to get him to allow their swords on the bus. Once he'd driven away the pair sheathed them in their usual way and Val pulled out the glass knife Nikki had used the last time she'd needed a weapon.

She felt sick just looking at it. She couldn't help it. She'd killed someone with that knife and every time she thought about it she could still smell the blood-soaked into her skin and caked in her hair. "I uhm…," she began and gagged a little before she had to look away. "I don't…"

"Nikki I know you...aren't like us but...you need to be able to protect yourself...especially in there," Hazel encouraged.

Nikki looked back to Hazel and Val but her stomach was in knots. She gently reached out and accepted the knife from Val and this time, she could swear it weighed at least twice as much as it had before. She shoved it down into her pocket as fast as she could so she wouldn't have to be touching it anymore and shook her head fiercely to shake the memories from her mind. "Fine," she breathed. "But I'm not...I won't," she began and trailed off before Val touched her hand to her arm.

"You won't have to okay? I'd rather you run and live then get hurt defending yourself anyway."

"Okay," she breathed out quietly as they began to lead her down the street. They walked by gas stations and trinket shops that Nikki had frequented when she'd lived here. Past the trailer park and even past the street she'd lived on. Part of her wanted to stop in and check on the old house but she knew that now wasn't the time. After only a few minutes of walking, Nikki found Val and Hazel crossing the street ahead of her and heading toward a large graveyard.

Once they were on the sidewalk Hazel and Val hesitated and Nikki nearly walked into them, not expecting them to stop. "What's up?" She asked quietly. She looked past the large stone wall that fenced in the plot of land and up the hill to where a single massive oak tree stood just off-center from the crest of the hill.

"We're here. It just doesn't hurt to be cautious," Val answered and turned to face Nikki. "Ground rules?"

"Don't touch anything or anyone, don't eat anything, don't make any deals or promises. Don't tell anyone who I am. Just say I am here with you two or with Kaye," Nikki rattled off quickly while pointing to her extended fingers. The twins had made her rehearse those rules on the bus and the entire time she'd been annoyed at how similar the rules were to the ones that Thorn had given her a month ago. The rules that she had broken in every single way possible. "And no one gets left behind," she finished, a little more quietly. That one was the only one she'd come up with herself.

"Right, okay," Hazel nodded her head and opened the tall iron gate to let them in and shut it behind them. Val held Nikki's hand all the way up the hill and once there, Hazel crouched down in the frosted brown grass. She grabbed at a section of it and Nikki was surprised to find a doorway open up in the earth beneath them at the base of a grave. Val led her down the stairs and into an earthen hallway much the same as the ones in the Court of Teeth. These were much more neatly cut and far less winding, however. It took only a few moments before the walls opened up and the trio found themselves in the main hall of the court. To Nikki's mild surprise there weren't very many faeries lurking around. There were a few here and there but it seemed that the Hall had been cleared for a reason. The only people around seemed to be knights or servants. The Throne at the back of the room was strangely vacant as well, though Val and Hazel seemed to know exactly where they wanted to go and none of the faerie knights seemed to have any interest in stopping them. Nikki looked ahead of them, quickly peeking around their shoulders to see that they were headed toward a table where only a few faeries sat.

One of them was Kaye and Nikki felt an overwhelming sense of relief wash through her veins as she realized this. She wore much the same kind of outfit she expected her to wear in the human world, not so much in faerie. Her chunky black boots transitioned harshly into a pair of thin black leggings, a band t-shirt with a fishnet bodysuit underneath that stretched down to her fingers, and her own necklace dangling from her neck, the red stone illuminated by the various lanterns around the hall. Her hair was positively green today and Nikki could hardly tell it apart from her skin.

She sat on the table with her feet rested on the bench below where the other two sat staring at documents that had been spread around the table. She stood out greatly compared to them, one, a woman with startlingly long and hot pink hair and pale skin, and the other, a male with flowing silvery hair that matched his eye color. His armor was leather and extremely intricate. Far too intricate for Nikki to study in the dim light of the hall. But as they came closer the two knights stood to greet them.

When they did Kaye noticed and turned to find the three of them and Nikki noticed a large smile spread across her cheeks. Nikki felt a small whoosh blow past her ear and saw some of her own hair fly up out of the corner of her eye as Lutie took off and flew over to Kaye, nestling into her green hair. She'd almost forgotten she was there she'd been so lost in thought on the way here. Kaye barely noticed too as she landed and immediately began knotting her fingers into the pixie's hair.

Kaye walked straight between Val and Hazel as if they weren't even there and walked straight into Nikki, throwing her arms up and around her shoulders with a smile. "I'm so glad you're okay," she said cheerily.

"You...are?" Nikki asked in a bit of a shock. They hadn't spent much time getting to know one another. She hadn't expected this from Kaye at all. This too was her first opportunity to notice just how much shorter than the rest of the girls Kaye really was. Her boots had pretty big wedges in the heels but she still only came up to Nikki's shoulder. "I'm okay," she shrugged and was about to hug Kaye back when she let her go and stepped back.

"Well, Thorn had us worried sick about you. Jerk," she rolled her eyes and Nikki had to agree, nodding her head to one side at the thought of just how many people Thorn could have asked about if they'd seen her after she'd left.

"King Roiben," Nikki heard Val speak and turned her attention back to the two who had stood, slowly realizing that one of them must not be a knight at all. She looked to Val and Hazel who gently bowed their heads and Nikki quickly made an effort to do the same.

"Prince Valiant," Roiben, the silver-haired man smirked a crooked smile and Nikki watched Hazel lose her composure with a small snicker.

"You're never gonna let that die are you," Val rolled her eyes with a smile.

"You're the only human to ever win a duel in this hall, how can I?" He asked and Nikki returned her attention to him as his eyes drifted to her. "Who have you brought before us?" He asked before Kaye skipped over to him and leaned to whisper in his ear. As she did, Nicole watched Roiben take in whatever information he was being fed and seemingly, be unphased by it. Had Kaye already told him about her? Either that or he was far better at controlling his facial expressions than Nikki was. "I see," he concluded as Kaye stepped back from him and clasped her hands behind her back. "Well you are welcome in the Court of Termites then miss Revin," he said and Nikki felt it necessary to bow her head to him.

"Thank you," she said softly.

"Come on, I'll show you around," Kaye said as she took hold of Nikki's hand and began to gently lead her away.

"Wha..wait I," Nikki looked back to Val and noticed her making a shooing motion with her hands.

"It's fine, don't worry, just stay with Kaye!" Val said after her.

"Okay," Nikki breathed out nervously as she was led behind the throne and into a hidden hallway behind it. Behind her, she was able to eavesdrop for only a few moments on the conversation she'd been stolen away from.

"We are waiting for one more as I'm sure you can guess," Roiben said before the female knight spoke up, her voice shrill and harsh.

"You are a king of Faerie. You need to stop relying on humans to fight your battles, sir," she scolded in a shrill tone but before Nikki could hear his answer Kaye spoke up.

"Sorry for dragging you away but I wanted to get some time to talk to you," she smiled back to Nikki as she slowed down. Nikki moved up beside her so they could walk together down the hallway. "They are all gonna be uptight and boring anyway."

"What's going on? Why does he need Hazel and Val's help?"

"Our court has a lot of enemies. We don't really play nice with others very well," she admitted with a nervous smile. "Roiben's planning to hire a few extra hands to defend the Hall if an attack comes and Hazel and Val are on that list."

"And...you're okay with that?"

"Not really," Kaye sighed. "But I'm not their mother...I don't get to tell them what to do," she shrugged. "It comes with the job."

"What the hell is wrong with all of you," Nikki sighed before she realized what she had said. "Sorry," she said quickly but Kaye just laughed. "Really though you all...trade favors with each other and constantly put your lives at risk when you could just...not…"

"Faeries aren't like humans Nik...we don't need to buy and sell material things. We make everything we could ever want ourselves and we have no use for money...the only thing faeries care about is power. Promising to fulfill an unspecified action at a later date is one of the highest forms of power you could ever have," she explained. "Especially for a human."

"That's why they do it? Why Hazel and Val and… Thorn makes deals with Faeries?"

"Yes. Having a faerie owe you as a human being can be a serious advantage."

"That's why that knight was speaking against your...husband?" She asked, confused as to what she should call him. Val called Ravus her husband? Had they had a ceremony? Were they legally married by humans? "Boyfriend?" Nikki asked and Kaye began to laugh again.

"Nothing so glamorous as that," she smiled a weak smile and Nikki thought for a moment that it may be fake. "I am Roiben's consort."

"Well that doesn't sound very...exclusive," Nikki admitted.

"It does not," Kaye confirmed. "It is though. He doesn't fool around with anyone else. We've been this way for nearly a decade now. A king may do as he pleases, with anyone in his court and they may not decline. He could have as many consorts as he desired but...he's never taken another yet…" she smiled.

"So...why are you the King's consort rather than his Queen?"

Kaye let out a short chuckle before she took in a deep breath. "I learned a long time ago that it's better this way. Honestly. Even after all this time the rest of the court really doesn't think too highly of me, and putting me on an equal throne to Roiben could cause them to revolt. They fear the power I have over him."

"Power? You're powerful because he loves you?"

"Well...I'm a risk because he loves me. I have power over him because he would do anything I asked him too, for better or worse," she breathed out before shaking her head. "Hooooo Nikki you and I have more in common than you may ever know," she smiled before knocking her elbow into Nikki's hip. "So spill, what happened with Thorn," she smirked, changing the subject.

Before she could answer they arrived at a wooden door and Nikki watched as Kaye twisted the knob and opened it up to reveal what Nikki was almost immediately sure was her bedroom. The most obvious reason for this was because, other than the desk being replaced with a bed, it mirrored the sheik of her office. As they stepped inside Kaye closed the door and navigated the drifts of clothing to the bed and patted the spot next to her. Nikki did the same and flopped down beside her before she lay back, hands above her head and gave a long sigh.

"He keeps pushing me away...he wants nothing to do with me Kaye," Nikki sighed and Kaye lay back as well, turning to face Nikki. Nikki looked over and was surprised to see her split black pupils staring back at her intently. It drove her crazy that Kaye acted like a perfectly normal human being but looked so otherworldly at the same time.

"I thought he must be...having a hard time of it. He's not the most...in-touch person emotionally speaking," she shrugged.

"Yeah no shit," Nikki rolled her eyes. She shifted so that she was facing Kaye on the bed and began to dig her pointed finger into the comforter restlessly. "I really thought that we were gonna be together but at this point I...I don't think he wants me at all."

"I mean I think he'd have kicked you out by now if that were true," Kaye thought out loud as her vision fell to the black cord around Nikki's throat. "You can take your glamour off while we are in here if you want. It's okay," she smiled. "I know it's hard to get used to seeing yourself as a different person but it does get better."

"That's not what...I'm afraid of," Nikki breathed out and had to avert her eyes from Kaye's gaze. "Well...that's not the only reason."

"Well, what else is it?" She asked and Nikki found her gaze drifting down Kaye's throat toward her collar bone. She had to shake her head and turn onto her stomach, pressing her face into the comforter to ignore it.

"I have a lot of trouble controlling myself now…" she mumbled into the mattress.

"Oh," Kaye questioned before she registered where Nikki had been looking, "oooooohhh," she breathed out. "Sorry," she shrugged.

Nikki shook her head against the heavy blanket and tried to concentrate on its scent. She could tell it hadn't been washed lately but the scent wasn't awful to her. It was just enough to keep her mind elsewhere. "Not your fault. I hate this. I hate everything about being this. Keeping this glamour on helps me suppress it a little."

"Okay well...whatever makes you more comfortable," Kaye said as she rolled onto her stomach. "Is there any way to fix it?"

"I didn't feel so bad after Thorn and I…well...had sex but that was only one time...I haven't even kissed him in a month and I think it's killing me...I've been feeling more and more sick and drained every day."

"Jesus you sound like a succubus from a bad anime," Kaye laughed lightly. "I need to fuck you till your dead or I'll wither away type shit," she smirked and Nikki groaned at the analogy. "Sorry, too much time spent with Corney," she admitted.

"Sometimes it feels that way honestly," Nikki said as she tilted her head up just enough to peek out from the comforter, keeping her nose and mouth buried in it.

"And you get those urges for what...anybody?"

"No...mostly just for Thorn…" she admitted before she felt her cheeks get red hot. "I've even...accidentally glamoured a few guys to look like Thorn and kissed them or...let them touch me and it makes me feel like a real piece of shit...but I can't help it sometimes. I get in this zone and I don't even know I'm doing it…"

"Damn you got it for him that bad?" Kaye asked and Nikki turned to face her.

"I...I do...sometimes I think I might even Lo," she began but found herself cut off by her own thoughts. Could she really finish that sentence? She'd been thinking about how she really felt about Thorn a lot lately and the word 'love,' had been floating in the air between the two of them a lot. At least, she thought it had. Nikki decided it would be better to change the subject than to keep dwelling on it. "What's up with the Prince Valiant thing?"

Kaye smiled and decided it would be better to answer her rather than press the matter. "Luis gave Val that nickname when they met. When Ravus started teaching her swordplay. After she won a duel against a faerie here in front of Roiben it kind of stuck," she chuckled. "Roiben loved the nickname so much that he refuses to let her live it down," Kaye giggled. "It's pretty fitting really."

"I'll say...those two fight so well they may as well BE Faeries."

"Sometimes I think they may fight even better," Kaye smirked. "More desperate to win," she thought aloud and it made Nikki remember another thing that Val had told her.

"New York's a good place to run away from your problems...what did she mean?"

Kaye's smile faded as she dug her nails into the comforter as Nikki had. "She's right," she shrugged. "Everyone of us ended up there because we couldn't deal with shit at home. That's not why we stayed but it's why we all met," Kaye explained and Nikki got the distinct impression she was dancing around what she wanted to say.

"You don't have to tell me everyone's shit I just...wanted to know why she'd said it."

"It's fine. I don't think they'd much care if you knew it all. It's simple really. Hazel had to put distance between herself and her king and brother. Her and Ben loved the same guy and the guy chose Ben," Kaye shrugged. "She lived with it for a while but it kept eating at her and she just needed space. I returned Kate to my mother and felt that I needed to give them time to be a family without me getting in the way of it," she breathed out. "And Val walked in on her mom trying to fuck her boyfriend so she ran away," Kaye said and Nikki gasped.

"No fuckin way," she half-whispered and half yelled.

"Yeah I think Val's takes the cake too honestly," Kaye shrugged.

"Val, Corney, Ruth and I all shared the apartment above Moon in a Cup when we first moved to New York. Now just Luis and Corney live up there."

"...Do you miss it? You started the place right?"

"Sure did. Opened my own business at eighteen," she smirked solemnly. "I miss it all the time...I miss THEM all the time…I've only been gone a month and...don't get me wrong it's what I've always wanted...to live with Roiben but...this isn't what I imagined. I knew it wouldn't be but...you can't blame a girl for dreaming right?"

"Well it's only natural to miss your friends Kaye," Nikki comforted as she turned to look at the pixie. "I think." Her eyes drew immediately to the nearly see-through red wings on her back, she must have been glamouring them in the hall because Nikki hadn't noticed them. "Just go visit them more?"

"It hasn't been safe lately. Ever since the coronation a lot of shit has been going down and I can't be risking things like that."

"Everyone keeps saying that the coronation went bad. What happened?" Nikki asked, fed up with the vagueness of everyone's excuses about it.

"Almost the entire royal family was murdered by one of the princes on stage for the entire world of faerie to watch," Kaye sulked, folding her arms in front of her as she rested her chin between them. "The grand general of the Elfhame military stepped in but instead of stopping the chaos he only added to it. He killed the prince that slaughtered his family and tried to take over but he had no true claim to the throne."

"Oookkaayyy I shouldn't have asked," Nikki thought out loud. "That's fucked up."

"Yeah, a bit," Kaye mused.

"So...why does that affect you guys?"

"Because Roiben made a deal to swear fealty to the new king, the youngest prince of the family. The only one who survived. It's not that I disagree with his decision, it's just that...it paints a target on our backs for all the courts that oppose the new king...which is most of them," Kaye rolled her eyes. "Cardin seems like he could actually grow into a decent king but...it might be too late by the time that happens."

"That why that knight out there seems so mad at Roiben? Cus he's willing to make deals with humans?"

"Oh no," Kaye shook her head and rolled her eyes. "That's just Dulcamara," Kaye said as she tucked a few stray hairs behind her long, pointed green ears. "She's loyal to a tee but she has a big fuckin mouth," Kaye whined. "All she does is bitch all the time," she laughed. "She's the best knight we've got though and we'd probably be lost without her," Kaye admitted and Nikki smiled.

"Hey how long...did it take for you to adjust to the fact that...you weren't human," Nikki asked shyly and felt Kaye place a hand on her. Her green fingers entwined with Nikki's and she felt a wave of relief wash over her and realized she'd been keeping her muscles tense. She tried to relax and let out a long sigh before Kaye answered.

"Not nearly as long as it's gonna take you. I knew faeries existed already when I changed. I also happened to fall in love with one who I've got all the time in the world to figure life out with. And I don't have horns that poison people," she smirked.

"Val tell you about that?" Nikki sulked.

"Yeah, she mentioned what...happened at the Court of Teeth. Sorry, you had to go through all that...are you okay?"

"...No," she said softly, squeezing Kaye's hand back tightly. "I...killed someone and...there's no consequences for it...how can I be okay with that?"

"It takes a lot of getting used to," Kaye nodded quietly. "I've only killed once before and I'm not even sure that I'm over it yet…I think it would be worse if you actually did get used to killing people."

"Well Val and Hazel don't seem to have much of a problem with it," Nikki huffed. "Makes me feel like I'm being childish…"

"Not everybody is a knight," Kaye smiled and placed a hand on Nikki's cheek. "Not everyone has to be. Everyone is different. Val and Hazel are wackjobs," Kaye laughed and in turn, Nikki couldn't stifle a chuckle. "Don't compare yourself to them. Don't get me wrong I love them to death but...they aren't normal," she shook her head.

"I guess that's a fair point but it's hard not to you know they...they're such badass chicks and like...they are both super pretty. They live lives that they seem to love, they kill like it's nothing...and you guys are the only friends I've ever had. How am I supposed to stop myself from comparing my life to yours," Nikki shrugged?

"You're young alright," Kaye laughed as she sat up. "You'll grow into who you're meant to be. And thankfully your mother is not around to mold you into a total nutcase," Kaye smirked and Nikki put up a fake frown.

"Wow rude," she joked and Kaye smirked.

"Trust me she was an absolute bitch you don't wanna be anything like her."

"You'll have to tell me sometime huh?" Nikki suggested and Kaye gave her a nod.

"You can come hang out whenever you want," she smiled. "Just maybe don't tell anybody that you're related."

"Can d-" Nikki began to agree before they felt a vibration run through the entire structure followed by a loud boom that made its way down the halls. "What was that," Nikki asked but she would get her answer sooner than Kaye could speak.


	6. Chapter 5

Carnivore! Carnivore!

Won't you come digest me?

Take away everything I am.

Bring it to an end.

Carnivore! Carnivore!

Could you come and change me?

Take away everything I am.

Everything I am.

-Starset, Carnivore

Chapter Five

Nikki jolted upright and as soon as she did Kaye's wooden door was blown off its hinges and splintered into the room. Kaye turned away from the door but, to their relief, her bed wasn't in a direct line from it and the large shards of wood missed them by several feet. A dust cloud kicked up from the hallway began to float around her and Roiben's room and they could hear footsteps coming toward them in the hallway.

Nikki's hand shot to the pouch of Thorn's hoodie and her fingers reflexively wrapped around the knife Val had loaned her. She saw Kaye too lifted her leg and slid her hand down into her right boot before she produced a much lengthier knife. Her boots came up almost all the way to her knees after all and Nikki was surprised at her lack of shock that Kaye would hide something like that within them. Kaye grabbed Nikki by her sleeve and hauled her to her feet and both of them ran to the side of the doorway to wait and see who was coming down the hall.

Kaye held her pointer finger up to her lips as she looked over to Nikki and back to the door and Nikki nodded. Her mind was racing and her grip was so tight on her knife that she could feel her hand going numb within moments. As the footsteps drew nearer to the door she tried to take a deep breath and calm her nerves but she had almost no chance of that happening. She was in a foreign place with barely any knowledge of the people around her or their problems.

Worse still, she hadn't given Thorn any clues as to where she was. As her chest heaved up and down she struggled to keep from making any noise. Her mind was glued to the fact that her last words to Thorn could be that he deserved to be alone. How could she have said that to him? He had been a jerk but had it really been necessary for her to run away from him like this? And now she could end up dead before she ever saw him again. Before she ever got a chance to tell him how she really felt about him… She hardly noticed when someone, or rather, something came into the room slowly. Nikki couldn't tell if it was a faerie or something else entirely. Before she could study it, Kaye slid behind it and drove her knife down into a crease in the armor it wore. Right between its shoulder and its throat where the strange leather pads failed to overlap

Nikki stood, frozen, watching it's thin and runny blood slide down its armor as the thing dropped to the floor, barely a gurgle escaping from its throat as it filled with blood. Nikki watched as it fell, studying its teeth, all of which were as sharp as knives. Its skin was tinted blue in most places and if she didn't know any better she thought that it may have gills on its throat. Its sword clattered to the ground amidst the far off sounds of screaming and clashing metal and Nikki looked back up just in time to see another one of them come through the door and tackle Kaye from behind.

Nikki watched as they both tripped over the corpse and fell in a pile beside it, the creature quickly putting Kaye into a headlock with little effort. "Nick," she coughed desperately and the thing looked up just in time to lock eyes with Nicole. She felt a cold wave wash through her as she tried to shut it off. Shut every emotion she was feeling up and lock them away. This was no time to start acting like a lost little girl again. She needed to see Thorn again. Tell him that she was sorry for what she'd said to him. She couldn't do that if she died down here in the dark for some battle that she had no context for.

Before it could react to her presence Nikki was driving her little glass knife downward and into the thing's throat just below its chin. Kaye shoved the creature off of her, though not before it had bled a considerable amount into her hair and onto her arm. She jumped up from the floor and grabbed the knife she'd dropped on her way to the ground before turning back to the door. Once she was sure no more of them were coming down the hallway she turned back to find Nikki on her knees, bloody knife in her hand, staring at the creature she'd killed.

She'd done it again. With an alarmingly small amount of hesitation, she'd murdered another faerie. Kaye took another cautious peek into the hallway before she crouched down beside Nikki and grabbed her hand. "Hey!" She whispered loudly and Nikki was so shocked she nearly dropped the knife. "Look I know. I get it okay?" Kaye began. "Look at me," she pleaded and Nikki barely managed to look over into Kaye's otherworldly eyes.

"I didn't have to," Nikki said as a tear ran down her cheek. "I could've made him let go of you, I could've! I didn't need to kill him and I did it anyway!" She shouted in hysteria but Kaye was quick to cover her mouth before listening for footsteps in the hallway.

"Look I understand. You were just protecting me. We need to get out of here, now. I can't fight and babysit so you need to bury this shit right now. Deal with it later, okay?" Kaye insisted and with one more look back to the dead bodies pooling in blood on the floor beside them Nikki swallowed the rest of her tears.

"Yeah...yeah okay but...what's happening. What are these things?"

"Seafolk," Kaye grumbled as she pulled Nikki to her feet. "They've come a long way for this fight," Kaye said as she led Nikki to the door and they both peeked out. No sign of any more of them but they could hear swords clashing back toward the main hall. Following a series of screams and shouts the pair of them saw a small wave of water coming down the hall as well. Nothing enough to knock them over, it was only up to Kaye's knees at most, but still inconvenient.

"Where are we going to go?" Nikki asked before she received her answer in the form of an eardrum-shattering noise. The way it hung in the air and silenced everything else but the splashing of the water against the walls. It lasted so long that Nikki began to wonder if it would have an end. It was a Wolf's howl. The way it echoed through the structure gave her goosebumps and combined with the cold water around her calves she shivered. "Thorn," she breathed out and took an unconscious step toward the main hall before Kaye grabbed her hand and forced her to a stop.

"Wait, we need to be careful. Go slow," Kaye encouraged as the pair began shuffling through the water hand in hand. "Drop your glamour."

"But you told me to," Nikki began before Kaye cut her off.

"Okay yes I said that no one here can know who you really are BUT that's before we dragged you into a battle. You can't use your magic with that glamour on and if you lose your knife you're going to be screwed. This isn't a play fight. Every one of those things is a knight trained to kill other knights. Stick with me, we stand a better chance together."

"Alright," Nikki breathed out nervously and shut her eyes as they paused in the hallway. Her glamour tore from her shoulders and frayed through her clothing until it disappeared into the air and water around them, her horns growing up from her scalp, eyebrows growing back out until they went over the edges of her face, and her ears poked up through her impossibly platinum hair. When she'd finished she turned to find Kaye staring at her with a strange expression on her face. "What?"

"You...you really do look like her…" was all she needed to say for Nikki to get the picture. "Come on," Kaye said as she shook her head, trying to refocus. As they came up behind the throne the pair peeked their heads around to find the main hall in complete chaos. "Where the hell is everybody," Kaye gasped.

Nikki too was shocked at the small amount of non-seafolk faeries in the hall. Roiben, Val, Hazel, and Dulcamara were all there, locked in battle, most of them fending off more than one combatant at a time out of necessity. The four of them were in a ring, knee-deep in water backs to each other so as to cover each other's sides. Kaye and Nikki could see from their perch that Val was bleeding from the side of her head. There was no slice in her skin so they figured she must have hit her head after the initial explosion.

There were a few other scattered knights around but they were few and far between. Many of the lights of the hall had been put out by splashing water or wooden tables being overturned. "Thorn!" The pair heard Hazel call out into the darkness of the other end of the hall and out of the darkness came a body in response. The leather-clad sea-folk's corpse smashed into the earthen wall at great speed beside Nikki and she thought she actually heard some of the bones inside shatter as it hit and splashed down into the water. Before he disappeared beneath the water she saw that his armor and body by proxy were filled with fang shaped holes.

Out from the darkness then came the wolf. From here he seemed even larger than the last time she'd seen him. His fur was soaked with water and it hung down around him. His teeth were dripping with water and blood as well and Nikki thought he must have thrown the merfolk with his teeth. Some of the soldiers surrounding Val and the others turned to face the wolf and watched as another one of their kin swung its blade at Thorn but was shocked when he lowered his head, twisted it to one side and closed his jaws around him. Nikki watched the blood evacuate it's body, staining the water around Thorn dark red.

After he tossed the corpse from his mouth he was moving again, sprinting at another group of knights, body checking others out of his way as they were thrown several feet from where they'd been standing.

Nikki couldn't really tell for sure but she thought that Thorn actually looked like he was sort of in control of his actions. She wasn't sure if that made his rampage any easier or harder to watch. She thought she was being a crybaby before? Watching Thorn tear through the sea-folk without second-guessing himself made her feel even more so. Before she could say anything though she heard Kaye call out for help and felt their hands leave each other as Kaye was pulled from their hiding place.

Nikki hadn't seen one of the knights sneak up on them at all. Had they come up behind them from the hallway? Nikki tried to turn around and look to the other side of the throne to find Kaye but she wasn't there. All she found was rippling water, and then she felt something grab onto her ankle.

Before she could turn back to look however she was falling, off-balance into the water beneath their feet. As her head went under she tried to keep her eyes open, only to find that the water in the Hall was ocean water, filled with salt, and it stung her eyes until she was forced to close them. She felt a set of hands all over her and she did her best to thrash her way out of them but she knew she couldn't overcome the disadvantage. She felt one hand grab at her chest a few times before the cord of her necklace tightened around her neck. She grabbed for the amulet but couldn't stop it from being torn off of her. Before the thing let her go though she felt its limbs go stiff and let her go. She moved to sit up but felt a hand grab her by the hood and haul her up to her feet. She sucked down a long desperate breath of air, only to find Roiben standing before her with his teeth gritted, looking around the room.

Nikki was too concentrated on catching her breath and finding her knife to notice his desperate expression. Everything seemed so loud now, Nikki thought, and she couldn't focus on what she was looking for. Her hand slid by something and she grabbed for it, surprised when instead of her glass knife she drew up Kaye's silver one instead. Holding the blade in her hand forced her to realize why Roiben had looked so disappointed when he'd pulled her from the water. "Kaye!" She shouted, looking around the room to see if she could find the pixie girl struggling under the waves.

As her vision darted around the room though she could not seem to catch sight of her. Instead, she began to notice how far she'd been dragged under the only two feet of water in the room. She was several yards from where she'd gone under. Roiben was fending off a knight from advancing on her and she couldn't spot the others in the chaos either. Instead, she turned her focus down to the blade in her hand and tried to concentrate on it. "Where do you belong," she whispered to herself before she said it again louder and channeled her magic through her fingertips and into the blade. "Where do you belong," she asked again and the blade began to shake violently in her hands. She pointed it around the room as Roiben cut down the knight and turned back to her.

The knife began to point to a far corner of the room and Nikki started hobbling through the corpse-filled water as fast as she could with Roiben right behind her until the pair came upon Kaye, pinned to a wall with a sea-folk's hand around her throat and a bloody knife pointed against her throat. This knight, however, was far different. She had dark brown skin, like a human's and Nikki had to assume it was glamour. She had long, ocean-blue hair and deep blue eyes to match and wore very minimal armor.

"Kaye!" Nikki shouted as she tried to run faster through the water. The girl turned her head to see who's called out for her prey and her eyes went wide in fear, more than likely at the sight of Roiben rather than of Nikki. The girl stood up and let go of Kaye but as she did her blade dug into Kaye's throat and dragged all the way up through her chin. It would have been fatal if Kaye hadn't had the ability to move her head, but the girl had let go of her grip to stand. Kaye still growled in pain before her hands flew up to her face in reflex to try and move the blade away but it was far too late for that. The blade came out of her lower jaw without cutting anything more than skin thankfully but she still began to bleed profusely from the long gash. The girl turned to flee and to Nikki's surprise, she dove headfirst into the shallow water and was out of sight in moments. Roiben moved to grab Kaye and Nikki looked back, hearing a yell coming from the waves accompanied with splashing.

This time it seemed to be that Roiben's knight, Dulcamara had been overwhelmed and pulled down into the water. Nikki moved to head that way but froze when Thorn came back into view, charging the pack of knights that were piled on top of the faerie woman. He slashed at one with his claws, leaving massive gashes down the knights back and he dropped into the water before he grabbed another one with his teeth and flung him across the room. The third knight on top of her began to flee and Nikki watched as Thorn reared up on his hind legs and Roiben called out.

"Thorn don't!" He shouted in desperation before Thorn slammed his weight down into the water. The splash of water came up even above Thorn's head but when the water settled they saw him lean his nose into the water and begin nudging at something. Before long he had dug his nose underneath Dulcamara's back and nudged her up to her feet.

"He didn't hit her," Nikki breathed out. She'd thought, just as Roiben had, that Thorn had lost control and was just killing everything in sight. Instead, another corpse temporarily floated to the surface of the waves as the wake pushed it away from where Thorn had landed on it. There must have been another knight under the water holding her down.

After this display of force and, Nikki noted, the fact that none of the blood soaking Thorn's fur was his own, the sea-folk began to retreat out of the hall. Nikki watched as Dulcamara staggered backward into Thorn and he stood there for a moment to allow her to catch her breath. She was coughing up a mixture of her own blood and saltwater. Before long though she pushed away from him and rested her hands on her knees as she continued to cough out the remainder of the saltwater.

Nikki then caught Thorn staring at her from across the room. She raised her hand slowly but before she could say anything he'd taken off sprinting after the retreating sea-folk. Before long he was out of sight, deep in the corridors of the Court of Termites and as the group tried to catch their breath they could hear the screams of the fleeing knights being mauled and trampled to death. Nikki moved to run after him but stopped when she heard Kaye behind her.

"Nikki don't," she coughed out softly before Roiben hoisted her up into his arms.

"Don't speak," he growled and for a moment Nikki thought he may actually be cross with Kaye instead of the attackers. He carried her through the water toward the throne, the only seat in the place tall enough to be mostly dry and set her upon it. Nikki could see her squirming and thought she heard Kaye say something but she couldn't quite hear all of it. Something about it not being proper for her to have that seat. Nikki found herself trudging toward Val instead of Kaye in the fear of what Roiben would do if she got between them right now. She found Val leaning against the wall, blood still streaking down her face as Hazel tried to help her but Val kept refusing.

"I'm fine," she slurred and Nikki could see that she was anything but. She began to slide sideways, nearly falling into the water as she tripped over a body right into Nikki's arms. She struggled to lift Val back to her feet and Hazel soon grabbed Val's other arm to balance out the weight. "Just a little dizzy," she slurred again as if she were drunk.

"Roiben where are we going, we can't stay here?" Hazel shouted across the room and she saw Roiben turn toward with a wild look in his eyes. Nikki saw he had ripped part of Kaye's soaked shirt off and tied it around her throat as best he could but was surprised when Kaye spoke again.

"Grandma's," was all Kaye could manage and when Roiben turned back to disagree the look in Kaye's eyes apparently said enough to keep him from doing so. Before anyone could get moving though they heard a set of splashing footsteps coming back toward them and watched as Thorn stalked back into the room, still in his wolf form. He glanced over to Nikki and she was worried about his lack of expression, but thankful when he lowered his head and walked straight up to Kaye and Roiben. He lay down in the water and looked toward his back and then back to Kaye.

Roiben grit his teeth in displeasure at the idea but he couldn't deny that Thorn would get them there faster. "Dulcamara," Roiben said harshly as he stood and lifted Kaye onto Thorn's back. She dug her hands into his fur and leaned forward into the back of his neck to try and keep her balance. Dulcamara was still coughing and her hands we becoming more and more bloody with each blast of air from her lungs. "You go with them," he ordered. She stiffened up to protest but between all the coughing she had no words to object. Roiben helped her up onto Thorn's back and before leaving he looked over to Val.

"I'm fine," she waved her hand softly. "Go," she requested and Thorn nodded before he took off at a gentle but fast pace back toward the exit so as to not throw them off his back.

"The rest of you follow me," Roiben ordered and, with no authority to deny the plan, Hazel and Nikki began helping Val follow Roiben the way that Thorn had headed. "And YOU," Roiben growled back at Nikki, "and I are going to have a little chat when we get there."

Nikki swallowed hard, her nerves threatening to creep back up and force her to comprehend everything that had just happened around her. She had to stay focused. She wasn't hurt and Val's health was in her hands. This was no time for losing it.

As they walked down the hall they saw daylight shining through the end of one of the hallways, presumably where the blast had originated. When they emerged they found fire trucks and police cars everywhere. Roiben didn't seem to mind too much and as they came rushing up to them he simply glamoured them to forget they'd seen anyone. They were allowed to just keep on walking and they followed the King of Termites right down the street in broad daylight. When they came to an old victorian, painted black with a little white fence around the small rectangular plot of land Roiben opened the gate and held it for the others. The front door was hanging open and so was the screen door. Once inside Nikki could see straight through to the rectangular tile kitchen where Dulcamara was standing with her back to them.

Her chest piece was in pieces in the living room, shirt too, and all she wore from the waist up was a stretch of cloth wrapped around her breast and tied behind her back. She had a very bloody palm-sized bandage just under the cloth below her ribs and Nikki could see how uncomfortable she was. She appeared to be staring off into nothing and had her arms folded under her chest. "Kaye?" Nikki heard from behind her and all Dulcamara did was nod upward to the ceiling.

Roiben turned and raced up the stairs to go find her while Nikki and Hazel set Val down on the couch in the living room. Nikki moved to the kitchen and moved past the faerie knight to search for a cloth. "Up," she muttered and Nikki moved one cabinet up and found what she was looking for. She moved to the fridge and bowled the rag in her hands before mashing her fingertips into the ice button until the rag was full. She closed it up around the ice before grabbing another rag and wetting it to clean Val's face before applying the ice.

When she got back however Hazel held out her hands and smiled. "I'll do it, thanks. Go find Thorn," she insisted and Nikki handed her both cloths before she moved back to the kitchen.

"Where'd Thorn go?" She asked but Dulcamara just stood and studied Nikki in silence. "Yo," Nikki waved her hand in front of Dulcamara's face but the knight caught her hand and threw it away.

"Upstairs. Looking for something to wear," she said dryly and returned her vision to where she'd been looking. Nikki turned to find their reflections in a mirror. Nikki was going to turn to leave but instead, she watched in the mirror as Dulcamara spoke. It wasn't harsh, nor spiteful but Nikki thought that maybe her voice was filled with regret among other things. "You are her daughter yes?"

Nikki hesitated to answer but eventually, she gave a single, silent nod in the mirror and she shivered as her eyes met the knights in the pane of glass.

"Figures...she still has secrets even after Death…" Nikki wasn't sure what she had done for this woman to hate her so much but she was getting sick and tired of people comparing her to someone she had never met before. She turned to leave before she felt Dulcamara grab her wrist gently. She turned her head back to find their eyes lock for a moment.

After a few seconds though Dulcamara's hand let her go and her vision sunk back to the floor. "Understand...I...I mislike being in debt...and now every one of us is," she breathed out and her arms returned to their folded position over her abdomen.

"Yeah well I'm not a big fan of it either," Nikki grumbled before she turned and headed through the living room and up the stairs.


	7. Chapter 6

You lying

And everything with you is trying

And I don't wanna keep on crying

If I'm the only one

And I been telling everyone I'm fine

But I feel like I lost my mind, oh

Am I the only one?

-Tessa Violet, Games

Chapter Six

At the landing she found a few doors, one side open and she could see Roiben standing in the doorway. She liked her head past him to find Kaye standing at a sink with the water running, a needle in hand, stitching her own wounds. Her shirt was off and her chest was bare besides the fishnet undershirt she'd had on and Nikki found multiple reasons to look away.

She wanted to say the biggest reason was that she couldn't stand to watch Kaye finish stitching the gash in her lower cheek, even though the rest was already sewn up, but the real reason was far worse. It was because despite all the blood and death she'd just witnessed, Nikki was still starving for the heat of someone else's body. Sure, she'd prefer Thorn, but right now, with all the adrenaline pumping through her, she wasn't sure her body could tell the difference.

She moved to the next room that she could find and it was there she found Thorn. The room looked comically small around him like it belonged to a child. The bed would barely be large enough for a teenager and all the colors of the room suggested it had been for a little girl at one point. She couldn't focus on that for long though because at the center of all of it was Thorn. He was a mess, to say the least.

His hair was wet and she noted a distinct lack of blood on him. He must have had time to take a quick shower and dry off before they caught up. Nikki noted a wet towel on the bed. He'd found a pair of grey skinny jeans he'd been able to squeeze into somewhere and he was currently digging through a drift of clothes for a shirt but everyone he found was far too small. He stood up straight, back to her as he realized she was there. She saw the muscles in his back ripple as he brought his hands up to the back of his head and gripped his hair tightly for a moment before he let them drop.

When he turned to face her she barely heard his words at all. His pants weren't buttoned up and she could tell he hadn't found a pair of boxers either the way the jeans hung on his hips. "What was the one thing I asked you NOT to do," he asked and she could see him flexing and unflexing his fingers.

"I...I don't," she began but he cut her off and took a step toward her.

"Did you even listen to the message I left you?" He growled and her vision snapped up to his eyes.

"I...yeah I didn't finish it though cus Lutie," she tried to explain before she realized she had no reason to do so. She wasn't the one who'd fucked up here was she? "Why the fuck am I explaining myself to you?" She shook her head in disbelief. "You don't fucking own me Thorn!" She yelled back at him and thought she heard Roiben turn to face her from the hallway.

"I'm just trying to keep you safe!" He yelled back at her. "And you fucking lost the necklace again! The Court of Termites is LITERALLY the worst possible place for you to be on planet Earth and you just went right in without thinking about it!" He shouted and pointed his finger at her.

She slapped his hand away though and pointed back, "I wouldn't have been there if you weren't such a fucking dick for the last month now would I?! I wouldn't have the stupid amulet or even know what the fuck or WHO the fuck I am if you hadn't taken the deal in the first place AND NOW IM STUCK LIVING WITH A GUY WHO TREATS ME LIKE TRASH!" She yelled at him and got the impression that the entire house had gone silent in order to listen to her.

Her emotions began to boil over. She wasn't used to yelling like this. She'd only had one screaming match with Thorn before and this time, just like she had then, she couldn't stop herself from letting a few frustrated tears out. "Just stop," she pleaded. She reached out for his hand and was a little surprised when he didn't pull away. "Tell me what's wrong...and I don't wanna hear more bullshit...tell me what I did Thorn…" she pleaded.

All Thorn did was look away from her. He didn't drop her hand, which was something, but he never seemed ready to speak up.

"Did I say something wrong? Do you just fucking hate me? I'd rather you tell me then keep arguing with you about shit that isn't the real problem...I'd rather you just tell me you hate me so I can get on with my life instead of barking up the wrong tree…"

"You didn't do anything," he muttered and she gritted her teeth.

"Tell me, Thorn."

"You didn't do anything wrong!" He said again. Nikki dropped his hand and took a step toward the door. He took a step toward her reflexively and she put her hand on the door frame.

"Last chance Thorn," she breathed out as tears streamed down her face. "Tell me or I'm gone," she swallowed hard. She hadn't expected this to be how the conversation would go but now she was sure that this needed to be done. If they were ever going to start being honest with each other then this needed to be the moment that he opened up to her or he may never be able to again.

"Nikki LISTEN," he stressed as he grit his teeth and lifted a hand to his face and gripped his skull hard. "YOU didn't do anything," he stressed again and as Nikki was about to turn to leave she felt Kaye's hand on her shoulder.

"Move over," was all she said and Nikki looked down to find Kaye, still topless, pushing past her. She jumped a little in surprise and let her pass and watched as she walked up to Thorn. "Thorn," she asked nervously. "What did YOU do," she asked and Thorn's grip on his head tightened. He began to growl a little as Kaye touched her hand to his forehead but he didn't swat her away. Every inch of Nikki's skin burned with what she thought was either embarrassment or jealousy, she really couldn't tell which. Embarrassed that she couldn't see that something was actually wrong with Thorn, or jealous of the fact that he wouldn't swat away Kaye half-naked, but he would do that to her if she tried.

"I can't," he growled through gritted teeth and shook his head. Nikki felt the air in the room shift as Kaye summoned magic to her fingertips and, slowly but surely, a thin red string grew from Thorn's ring finger and slowly worked it's way past them and out the door, Nikki watched as it went down the stairs and out the front door before turning back to them.

"What is that?" She asked nervously, studying how the string was tied to his ring finger on his right hand.

"THAT," Kaye sighed, "is the explanation you are looking for. Can you tell her now?" Kaye asked him and Nikki saw as he took several deep breaths and nodded his head. He took a step back and sat on the bed, face in his hands. He wasn't gripping his head anymore and his expression was less harsh and she could easily see that he was calming down.

Kaye turned to leave the room and Nikki caught her by the arm reflexively. "Wait," she pleaded. "I don't…" she began but trailed off.

"It's okay, we'll be right downstairs if he needs an ass-kicking okay?" Kaye smirked and Nikki shuddered at the way it pulled her stitches taught in her throat.

Kaye shut the door behind her and Nikki just watched the thread floating in the air. Several moments of silence passed before she found the courage to speak up. "Well?" Was all she asked in a small voice. "Should I even bother asking? Just because you can tell me doesn't mean you're going to…"

"I couldn't say," he said solemnly. "It's part of the enchantment. I couldn't tell anyone or lead anyone to believe that I was enchanted...AM enchanted," he looked down to his finger.

"To be a dickhead?" Nikki frowned and folded her arms under her bust. "That's a lame excuse," she said and he smirked a little.

"No that's just me, unfortunately," he gave her a weak smile as he looked up at her before he felt her hand smack him across the face. Not as hard as she had a few days ago but still, enough to help her get out her frustration. "Yeah, I guess I deserve that…"

"You deserve a punch in the fucking dick Thorn," she shouted down into his face and he closed his eyes against her words. "Now stop handing me excuses and tell what the fuck is wrong with you!"

Thorn took a deep breath before he finally spoke. "A few days after you moved in I...I was going through some old shit while you were out of the house...spring cleaning my life if you will," he joked and she cocked back her fist. He put his hands up though and she didn't swing, waiting for him to continue.

"I found a box of Anya's shit in the back of the closet and," he began before lifting his finger for her to see. "There was a ring in it. Male sized, fit me perfectly."

"So naturally you HAD to put it on. God if you love her so much go find her," she said before she turned away to head for the door but his hand shot out and grabbed her wrist. He felt her entire body tense up and her voice became very low.

"You know last time this didn't go so well for you so you better let go of me," she threatened and to her surprise, he didn't.

"I could tell the ring was enchanted, it felt like my old one so I thought maybe she had meant to give it to me. Guess she probably did but decided against it for good reason…" he sighed. "It enchants the wearer to love the person who made it."

"You're the one still wearing it so you must not want to stop loving her," Nikki growled, jealousy burning on her tongue

"I can't take it off. It's enchanted to stay on."

"Then have Kaye break the spell! Isn't that what she fucking does? Curses and Enchantments?! It's on her fucking door," Nikki cried out as her tears returned to her eyes. She didn't want to hear any of this. She expected him to make excuses and apologize, not to have an actual reason for his bullshit. She couldn't make herself turn to face him. She was sick and tired of giving her tears to him like this.

"Too strong. She doesn't have the magic to get rid of something like this," he shrugged and as he tried to pull Nikki around to face him she wrenched out of his grip.

"Then why the fuck are you still here…" she sobbed. "Why haven't you run off to go find her and make her take it off...or to be with her…" Nikki asked but she was afraid she wouldn't like the answer.

"Just because I love her doesn't mean I want to be with her...and besides I did look...I looked for over a year, high and low...called in all my favors to try and find her and I never did. She doesn't want to be found…"

"So what?" Nikki sobbed as she finally turned to face him. "You couldn't just tell me you hated me or tell me to get lost? How long were you gonna wait to tell me that you wanted me gone? You won't live forever Thorn!" She yelled as she shoved her hands into his chest. He caught her hands though and held them against him as he fell backward, tripping over a small drift of clothing onto his back on the mattress, Nikki falling down with him.

Nikki let her tears loose and lay there crying into his shoulder. She felt pathetic. No matter how much she didn't want to need him, no matter how fucked up this situation was, she still wanted him. She still wanted to lay just like this with him for every second he would allow.

"How did you know her name…" he asked quietly and she sniffled a few times to try and stop crying.

"What?" She asked through hyperventilating.

"When you...left you said her name...how did you know?"

Nikki's thoughts ran back to the previous night and she was startled as she realized that they had only had their fight a single day ago. The sun was just ducking behind the horizon outside the window and she looked back to Thorn as she wiped her eyes into the sleeve of his soaking wet hoodie.

It wasn't until then that she realized every inch of her was still sopping wet. She'd been so occupied with finding Thorn and helping Val that she'd forgotten to dry off or at least change clothes. Her wet platinum hair lay in stiff piles on the bed and on Thorn's chest and she pushed her hands against him so she could stand. "Sorry," she breathed out and tossed all her hair over her shoulder. "You just showered...I should go…" she suggested as she walked to the door.

She was surprised when this time he didn't try to stop her. She wasn't sure if that was disappointing or not but when she made it to the door and touched her fingers to the wood of the handle she hesitated. "You...called me Anya when I was singing to you on our way to the hospital...it wasn't hard to guess who that was…"

Thorn was silent for a long time as he stared off into the ceiling and Nikki waited as long as she possibly could for a reply. "She...used to sing to me when I needed to relax...or couldn't sleep…"

"And when you thought you were going to die you wished that I was her…" Nikki breathed out calmly. She wasn't sure how she felt about it but all the emotions she felt in her chest simply didn't translate into her voice for once.

"No that's not…" he began but stopped when he saw her turn and shake her head. When he looked into her glowing blue eyes, bloodshot from crying and saltwater, he lost the rest of his sentence.

"Don't…," she said softly and waved her hand absently. "Don't lie to me Thorn," she blubbered weakly.

"I didn't want...look Nikki you...deserve somebody a lot better than me," he whispered in shame and sat up. "I'm not what you need."

Nikki felt the air choke up in her throat as his words broke over her. "Then be better," she cried before she ripped open the door and walked out, slamming it behind her before she walked straight into the bathroom where Kaye had been and shut that door behind her as well. She stopped and leaned her back into the old wooden door and sank to the floor, arms wrapped around her soaking wet legs as she buried her head in her knees and cried.

This was only given a few moments to last before Nikki grit her teeth and tried to dry her tears. She stood from the floor and began to peel off her soaked clothing before she moved to the shower and cranked the hot water. Once warm she stepped in and set to work washing away the salt, dirt, and blood from her skin. Once she'd finished she stood against the wall, arms folded across her stomach with her eyes closed, absorbing the heat of the shower. It felt good to finally relax. To say this wasn't how she pictured her week going would be an understatement. She'd never planned to get so wrapped up in the faerie world but it seemed the problem had come to her...again.

Only this time she had the feeling things were only going to keep getting worse rather than better. What if she really could never go back to having a normal life. What if this was normal now. Could she really get used to living like this? Living amongst faeries and bat shit crazy humans who couldn't keep their noses out of the wrong places? It was nice to have friends to rely on but Nikki had found rather quickly that having friends had drawbacks.

Having friends meant you cared about those people. And if you cared about a crazy person who chased death around willingly everywhere they went...what were you supposed to do if they got hurt or killed. She wasn't able to finish her conversation with herself before she heard someone pull the bathroom door open and step inside silently. "Sorry, I'll be out in a minute," she said weakly, not giving it much thought until she heard the person pull down a zipper and shuck off their pants. Almost before she'd realized it she had started to smell the familiar scent of her roommate and when Thorn climbed into the shower behind her she refused to turn around.

She stayed mostly still as his arms threaded under hers, her only movement was to shift her arms so they rest atop his. After a moment she felt his chest press against her back and felt it rise and fall with his breath. They stayed just like that, silently for what seemed like ages until he finally spoke up.

"I'm sorry," he said so softly she barely heard it.

"Don't be sorry Thorn...be better…" she breathed as she turned in his grasp to look up into his dark brown eyes. In the dark of the shower, they looked positively black. "Be the guy I moved in with...be the Thorn that offered to take me home...I don't care if you love her... That doesn't mean you have to treat me like an afterthought. Like I'm an inconvenience to you…"

She watched as Thorn solemnly nodded his head softly before she spoke again. "I'm not asking you to be a fucking superhero you know I just...I want," she began before she reached up and placed a hand on his chest. "I just want the guy that made me feel beautiful despite being a fucking mess...despite being a monster...the guy that made me believe that everything really was going to be okay when the world was crashing around me...I want you without all your bullshit excuses...without armor," she muttered softly

Her body was betraying her again. Every inch of her ached for this. To finally be alone with Thorn with no distractions but that was the problem. There WERE distractions. People waiting for them downstairs were the least of their issues right now. All of the unsaid things between them were boiling inside her mind and they would continue to do so if she couldn't keep control of herself.

"You still haven't told me why Thorn…" she muttered softly.

"Why what?" She felt his fingers begin to slide back and forth on her shoulder blades and her mind went blank for a moment. She ground her teeth together for a moment and shut her eyes tightly to try and keep her concentration on getting an answer out of him.

"Why you didn't ask me to leave…why you can't just tell me that you don't like having me around…" she almost growled through her teeth.

"We made a deal," she felt him shrug and it took every ounce of her strength not to hit him.

"Come up with a better answer Thorn or I swear to God," she huffed. She felt him sigh and waited for him to say more but became nervous when he took too long. "You really don't like me at all do you…"

She felt his hands move from her shoulders, up past her neck until his thumbs were rested on her cheeks. She leaned into his touch and felt disgusted that he could control her so easily. Ashamed that she cared about him so much when he couldn't even tell her that he didn't hate her. Nevermind not being able to tell her that he liked her.

"I don't hate you," he finally said softly and she opened her eyes to find him staring into the linoleum of the wall. "I don't want you gone…"

"Then what do you want," she pleaded. "Please just tell me, Thorn...You...aren't gonna be around forever and I don't wanna waste your time if you don't want me…you know I," she hesitated and brushed a long grey finger across his cheek. "How I feel about you…"

"I know that I just...I don't understand why you'd still want me when...you could have anybody you wanted. Anyone or anything you can dream of could be yours and yet you pick the guy who's enchanted to be in love with someone else…" he whispered and Nikki's hand balled into a fist against his chest before she let it relax and slide behind his neck.

She pulled his lips to hers and drank a long deep kiss from them and almost immediately became dizzy with her own lust. When she finally pulled her lips away from his her eyes remained shut as she savored the taste she had been waiting nearly a month for. She may be pissed at him, she may want to punch him in the throat...and he may deserve all of it.

But she could never deny how delicious his lips were. She couldn't even imagine trying to live her life without feeling the warmth of his body on hers. "I guess you don't understand it either," she heard him whisper and she could almost hear the smirk on his voice.

"Shut up Thorn," she breathed desperately before yanking him back to her, pressing her lips back to his hungrily. Her arms went under his and around his back and she dug her nails into the muscles of his shoulders and felt goosebumps perk up across her body as his fingers slid down her back and came to rest on her hips. Her nails dredged down his back and she felt him squirm with a mixture of pleasure and pain that made her lips curl up into a smirk of her own.

She didn't care that he loved someone else. She didn't even care that he may ONLY love someone other than her. She needed this. She'd needed it for weeks. And finally, the Thorn in front of her was not only willing, but it was actually him. Not some half-baked copy that she'd absent-mindedly turned a stranger into. Hell, she had half a mind to ask him what Anya looked like so she could glamour herself to look like the girl he really wanted to be sharing this shower with. Anything to make this moment last as long as possible.

Her nails finally made it to his lower back before digging in and the grunt she elicited made her think she may have drawn blood but she didn't care. She deserved this. She deserved to tear Thorn to shreds after this last month and she thought it was rather generous of her to do it in a way that would let Thorn die from pleasure rather than just pain.

She leaned on him and he took a step back until she felt him hit the wall of the shower, the water pouring down above their heads and between their faces. She brought her hands back to his chest and pinned him to the wall, breaking their kiss for only a moment before her lips and teeth were at his neck. She kissed and prodded her way down his throat and to his shoulder before she dug her nails into his chest and raked them down his abdomen, leaving deep red trenches in his skin, and when she sank to her knees she found exactly what she'd hoped for. She grabbed hold of him and blinked her bright blue eyes up at him teasingly.

His eyes were only barely cracked open as he stared down at her, fists balled against the porcelain wall behind him. His bottom lip was wedged between his teeth and she felt an incredible urge to take the plunge but decided instead to tease him more. First, she blew weakly on him before she puckered her lips and slowly, ever so slightly moved in and pretended to kiss him as she squeezed harder and harder. She watched him squirm and couldn't help the smirk that pulled across her lips.

"Fuck you," he snickered and she watched as his arms flexed, trying to control himself.

"Oh come on, you're a big strong werewolf," she teased before licking him from base to tip and watched him squirm again, "Fuck me yourself."

Nikki kept kissing him. Kissing him as if she wouldn't be satisfied until she'd kissed every inch of him. She loved watching him squirm in her grasp but a small part of her did want to know what would happen if she teased him to the point of losing control. She'd been completely in control the last time and while she'd enjoyed it she still wanted to know how far she could push him before he snapped.

Once satisfied with her work she stood and turned to face away from him. She lay back against him and lifted an arm to wrap behind his head as she began to grind her hips up and down against his. "Come on wolf boy, balls in your court," she laughed as she felt him struggle to keep his hands off of her.

"You might not like that," he chuckled through gritted teeth and she frowned for a moment before she let her thighs spread a bit. When she did she felt him slide between her thighs before she pressed them back together and began to rock her hips back and forth.

"Why don't you find out," she grumbled and felt him begin to shiver with each of her movements until, at last, she felt his hands clamp down on her hips to force her to stop moving right at the crest of her movement. "Mmmm good boy," she smirked as his fingers gripped into her skin. He adjusted himself before she felt him pull her back onto him and Nikki had to slap her hand over her mouth to stifle her reaction.

She'd waited for this. For just this moment for longer than she could ever have imagined would be necessary. Her eyes narrowed to slits and her teeth clamped down on her lower lip as Thorn fulfilled her wishes completely.

"Mmmm finally."


	8. Chapter 7

'Cause nothing satiates me

And I don't think that I hate me

But, bad or good

Seems nothin' could

Take away this tasteless haze

-Tessa Violet, Haze

Chapter Seven

Nikki drew in a long breath as her hands slid up her thighs, abdomen, and chest as she let out a long-overdue held breath. She felt incredible. The lights of the bathroom weren't stinging her eyes. The air didn't feel like poison. She didn't feel like she'd spent a month binging on junk food or laying around the apartment waiting for Thorn to want her.

She felt alive. Nikki stood there, staring back at herself in the mirror that Kaye had used to stitch up her cheek and neck. Thorn was behind her drying off but she could hardly tell that he was there at all. She still felt and looked like a monster, but still riding off the high of finally getting what she wanted, she thought she may actually like it. The way her long platinum hair shone against her dull grey skin. The way the old lights in the room made her greyish-blue skin seem to glow lilac. Her antler-like horns reminded her of a crown. Her long and pointed ears poking up through her hair. Everything. For a few moments, she thought she may actually like the girl in the mirror.

That only lasted until Thorn finally spoke up and moved between her and the mirror to comb through his hair with his fingers. "They are waiting for us downstairs," he sighed before he moved and grabbed the pants he'd found from the floor and began feeding his legs through them. She watched as he did and tried to come down from her cloud before she saw him put his hand on the doorknob and she finally found the words she wanted.

"Thorn do you…" she trailed off though, not sure that she wanted to hear the answer.

"Do I?" He asked, turning back to face her.

Nikki felt his eyes all over her as she wrapped her arms nervously around her abdomen. She wanted to ask him if he loved her. She wanted to ask if he could live with loving two people at the same time. The question had been burning on her tongue for far too long and she felt she needed to know. That she DESERVED to know. However, she couldn't will the words out of her lips. All she could get out was "Do you regret this?" Quietly.

She saw his lips stretch into that silly smirk that drove her wild though and a short, "No," pass out of them. He left shortly after and Nikki had to stop herself from throwing herself at him before he could get out the door. They'd been up here for an hour and she was sure the others were growing very impatient. She'd thought at one point she'd heard China clanging together and hoped that they had found a way to entertain themselves with food while they waited.

Nikki finished drying her hair as best she could without a hairdryer, which wasn't very well, before she slipped across the hall into the bedroom and sifted through the clothing around the room. There wasn't much of anything in her size but she'd managed to make a black band t-shirt look like a crop top and found a pair of leggings she could almost squeeze into. She got the impression that they must be Kaye's on account of how short she was, and they only went halfway down Nikki's calves and clung to her butt for dear life. She wasn't entirely sure that they wouldn't split right up the center the first time she bent over so she hunted down a velcro black skirt to put over them that only barely made it past her butt. Either Kaye liked to dress up for...special occasions, or she really was that much shorter than Nikki. When she came down the stairs she found that someone had run some of their coats through the dryer and they were folded on the couch beside where Val was struggling to keep from falling asleep. Dulcamara stood behind the front door, peeking through the blinds in the glass at who knows what.

'Probably keeping watch,' Nikki shrugged as her vision moved over to Roiben and Kaye, who stood in the kitchen doorway with mugs of hot tea in their hands. Kaye had redressed herself in some of what were definitely her own clothes, a pair of black jeans and fuzzy socks with tea leaves sewn into the design. She wore a deep maroon hoodie as well with the words 'Moon in a Cup,' plastered on the front and when Nikki looked back to Val she found her wearing a carbon copy of the hoodie. It was tight fit on her but she figured it was better than nothing. Thorn had retrieved his hoodie that Nikki had been wearing from the pile of dry clothes and while Nikki was disappointed that she couldn't have it she understood that he needed it more right now.

Hazel was beside Val on the couch, holding a new ice pack to her partner's head and Nikki could see that they had gotten Val cleaned up pretty well but she looked like she wasn't in any condition to go anywhere. When Nikki made it down the stairs she saw Dulcamara turn to her and for a moment she thought she saw her scowl but it was hard to tell. She sat on Val's other side and was immediately concerned by how long it took for Val to turn her head and register that she was there. "Hey," Val said softly with a weak smile and Nikki looked to Hazel.

"She's definitely got a concussion. She's had worse but she's done for a while," Hazel confirmed and Nikki nodded slowly before she slipped her hand into Val's and smiled back to her.

"Now that we are all present," Roiben began, commanding the rooms attention. "You all need to explain yourselves. And if I don't like the answer…" he said, concerningly calmly. "We are going to have ourselves a problem."

Nikki looked at the king's partner and had to admit that Kaye didn't look very confident about what they had to tell him. "Who are you," Roiben asked, directed at Nicole. "And why did you bring something into my Court that the sea-folk were willing to start a war over?"

"In her defense," Kaye finally spoke up and Roiben looked down to her. She touched one green, four jointed finger to the necklace around her throat. "They came for both of them," she sighed and Roiben's eyes widened so minutely that Nikki almost couldn't tell the difference. His vision snapped back to Nikki quickly, a wild look growing in his eyes. His hand snapped up from his side and, surprisingly given his rage, he sat his mug of tea down gently on the entertainment center before he advanced on Nikki. Nikki could see the muscles in his jaw twinging and she snapped up to her feet, trying to take a step back but when she did she felt Dulcamara's hand latch onto her arm to stop her in her tracks.

She looked to the knight. Her pointed teeth were grinding together furiously but when she looked back to Roiben she saw Thorn step between them and put his arm up, elbow to Roiben's chest to stop his advance.

Nikki tried to keep herself calm but when Roiben spoke she wasn't sure that that was going to be an option. "Move or be moved Thorn," he growled out but Thorn didn't budge.

"You aren't going to touch her without killing me Roiben," he said calmly and Dulcamara spoke up.

"You WILL address him as King of the Court of Termites you ungrateful wolf!" She spat out, but Thorn just turned his head to her with a smirk.

"Who's gonna make me? You?" He said and Nikki got the impression that Thorn was willing to take that chance. "You'd be waterlogged at the bottom of the main hall right now if I hadn't seen you go under," Thorn growled and Nikki felt Dulcamara's grip on her arm loosen. "This is how you're gonna repay me?" He asked as he turned back to Roiben. "You'd all be drowned right now if I hadn't been there."

Nikki looked back over to Dulcamara and found the knight looking back at her. Her eyes were filled with regret and remorse but after a moment she let Nikki go. "He's right," Dulcamara sighed.

"Roiben that's enough," Kaye said, clearly annoyed with his actions. Nikki had wondered why she'd taken so long to say something but maybe she was testing him. To see if he'd give up the idea of killing her on his own. Roiben stood up straight and Thorn backed off of him.

"Explain yourself," he demanded with a grudge in his voice and Nikki began to speak.

"I am...Nicnevin's daughter. I didn't know until a month ago that I was a faerie or that any of this shit existed. I didn't know her. I'm not her," she pleaded for him to understand. "I was told I shouldn't tell you or reveal myself unless necessary while in your court because your...subjects wouldn't like it."

"Sound advice," Dulcamara growled out.

Roiben just continued to speak, coming to terms with the information faster than Nikki expected. "And they have her amulet now."

"The Court of Teeth stole it a month ago and now the sea-folk have it," Thorn answered. "They may never stop coming for it."

"They'll stop if we just let them have it," Nikki scolded and everyone in the room turned toward her in surprise. "What?"

"We need to get it back," Thorn answered her with shock in his voice. "Don't you want it?"

"No I don't want the stupid thing," she said, incredulous. "Why would I? The fucking thing only keeps almost getting us killed!"

"But you need it to blend in?" Hazel suggested before Roiben spoke up.

"More than that. They could use it to topple the new king. I cannot sit by and let that come to pass while I have sworn fielty to the throne," he grumbled and Nikki was no longer sure if he was more angry at her or at himself.

"It's not your problem," Nikki heard Thorn speak up and the tips of her ears became hot with fury. "It's mine."

"Why?" She asked, more loudly than she wanted to and Thorn turned to face her. "Why is it your problem?"

"I owe you," he said with a smile and Nikki's mood finally dropped back to normal as her anger pumped through her body.

"Then do something else! Anything else! I don't want you going after it again!" She yelled and stepped up to him but he didn't budge.

"This needs to be done Nikki," he said softly and reached out to hold her but she slapped his hand away and continued to yell at him.

"No! Stop risking your life for me! I don't want you to!" She cried out and Thorn's eyes softened as Nikki's pooled with tears. "Let someone else do it," she pleaded softly. "If it has to be done then I want someone else to do it…" she blubbered and this time when Thorn moved to put his arms around her she let him and rested her head in his shoulder. "Please."

She felt his fingers thread through her damp blonde hair and she tried to relax herself. She hadn't meant to break down like this and she felt like a child. She felt all the eyes in the room on her and became even more self-conscious about how often she found herself crying. She was sick of feeling this way.

"We need to get back," Dulcamara finally said, breaking the silence. Nikki pulled out of Thorn's grasp and watched as the knight walked across the room and began replacing her chest, shoulder and arm plates as best she could, wincing several times from her stab wound.

She saw Roiben sigh before turning to Kaye. "Will you PLEASE," he stressed, "lay low...stay somewhere safe."

Nikki watched as Kaye lowered her head and silently nodded. Roiben lifted his finger to her chin and tipped her head until their lips met and Kaye drew a long kiss out of her king. "Stay with Valarie," he suggested as he and Dulcamara headed for the door. They took one last look around the room before leaving and heading back to access the situation under the graveyard.

"We should really get her home to Ravus. He'll be able to help her more than we will," Hazel said softly as she brushed some hair out of Val's face.

"Roiben will want me gone for a while…" Kaye sighed. "I'll go with you guys back to New York. He's gonna be in a shitty mood for a LONG time after that."

"Didn't we win?" Nikki asked naively.

"I guess but it was at...great cost," Kaye sighed and shot a look at Thorn. "The entire Court of Termites owes Thorn a debt now...not to mention Roiben owes Val and Hazel for fighting too. Combine that with the fact that hardly any of our forces participated in the battle and Roibens going to rip shit when he gets back," Kaye said with a hint of dry sarcasm.

"Where were they all?" Nikki asked.

"Probably trapped in different parts of the hall by the water," Kaye shrugged. "Who knows. We should get going soon though," Kaye suggested.

Nearly an hour later the group was helping Val up the steps and into a bus. Darkness had fallen and it was mostly empty. Kaye glamoured the driver and passengers to ignore them and when the group finally sat down Nikki found herself beside Kaye rather than Thorn. The wolfman had taken a seat for himself while Hazel watched Val and tried to keep her from falling asleep.

"Kaye could...could you teach me a little more about...magic?" Nikki asked nervously. "Unless you wanna rest or…" she said softly, her eyes drawn to the stitches that climbed up her throat, "whatever…"

"Hey," Kaye said, lifting Nikki's chin gently to look her in the eye. "I'll be fine okay? This isn't your fault."

"It is though…" Nikki protested. "All I ever do now is get my friends into trouble…"

"They wanted to find me too you know? They'd have shown up whether you were there or not. And if you weren't there I'd have been killed twice over tonight," Kaye smiled and grabbed Nikki's hand. "It's just gonna be a really unattractive scar. No big deal," Kaye joked and Nikki couldn't help but chuckle. "What do you wanna know?"

"Well I…" she began. "I understand how to do magic. I've glamoured people and myself even though I'm not great at it. I even tricked Thorn's body out of hypothermia by making him think it was warm out. But I just feel like I lose control a lot," she sighed and stared over at Thorn who she thought may have dozed off against the window.

"I know the feeling," Kaye sighed. "I actually enchanted a kid through my original glamour to like me. He became obsessed and I hadn't done it on purpose at all."

"Well, what else can I use it for?"

"You can conjure weapons that will deal real damage. I've seen that done a few times but it's really difficult. You used it on my knife earlier to find me beneath the water right?"

"Yeah I did...didn't know I could I just hoped that it would work."

"Well if you just wanna know how to control it better than all you really gotta do is find a way to concentrate through your distractions. You must be completely focused on what you're trying to do. You just need practice," Kaye shrugged. "Nobody can really teach you these things it's just a matter of experience. And if you refuse to glamour things and people well then you're never gonna get any better at it."

"I guess that's fair but like...doesn't it...make me a bad person? Forcing people to forget things or to tell me whatever I wanna know?"

"Nikki...you need to come to terms with the fact that you aren't human anymore. I know it's hard and that I had a much easier time than you are but...you need to stop hoping that one day you're gonna wake up and this will all just be a really weird nightmare. This is what you are now. Rather than hate it, it would be better to embrace it...right?"

"I know…" Nikki grumbled and wiped her face in her hands roughly. "I know you're right but...it's just…" she began as she looked up and down Kaye's green-skinned body and her green hair before she sighed. "You don't look like a freak...you're a cute pixie and I'm this," she gestured to her horns and much too long eyebrows," fucking mess."

Kaye laughed shortly but tried to swallow it for Nikki's sake. "Well, I don't think you look like a mess. In fact, I think you're the only one that thinks that" Kaye let out a sly smirk. "Pretty sure Thorn likes it actually."

"Thorn likes pretty human girls…" Nikki sighed but felt Kaye squeeze her hand.

"Oh please," she rolled her eyes and laughed. "Thorn loves faeries. Do you think he dated Anya just for her personality? He loved the way she looked. Besides with how loud you two were in the shower it seems like he likes you just fine," she smirked and Nikki's cheeks lit up pink.

"I don't know...his whole life revolves around these stupid favors and most of the time I feel like he's only around because he thinks he owes me...to be honest, I feel like I'm the one that owes him…"

"Nikki seriously," Kaye smiled. "Try to ease up on yourself okay? Thorn is an idiot," Kaye laughed and Nikki had to laugh with her. Kaye was quiet for a few long moments and Nikki wasn't sure she was ready for what she would say next. "He's also crazy about you," she murmured and Nikki's breath hitched in her throat. Kaye saw her frozen expression and giggled. "It's not hard to see. He's just too stupid to say it because he doesn't want to be responsible for hurting your feelings. He thinks he's not ready. But you're breaking his walls down. He likes you," Kaye smiled as she squeezed Nikki's hand.

"Now if only he could tell me himself…" Nikki smiled.

"He will," Kaye nodded before returning her attention to the buildings and trees sliding past them outside the window. "I know it...have you told him?"

"Told him what?"

"That you love him?" Kaye asked point blank and Nikki gently slapped her hand over Kaye's mouth.

"Sssshhh dude he's right there!" Nikki half whispered and half yelled as Kaye began to laugh behind Nikki's hand. Nikki glanced over at Thorn and exhaled a deep breath when she found he hadn't moved or reacted to Kaye's words. She dropped her hands and Kaye began to speak again.

"I'll take that as a no," she smirked.

"He knows how I feel…" Nikki breathed out as her vision dropped to her own hands in her lap.

"If you haven't told him then what makes you so sure?"

"Don't my actions speak loud enough for him to know…?" Nikki frowned.

"Well, this is Thorn we are talking about. The guy who's closed off his emotions and thinks he doesn't understand you. He may be afraid to assume that you have actual feelings for him beyond the physical. He doesn't want to make a mistake and let himself get attached to someone just because the sex is amazing," Kaye laughed again and Nikki rolled her eyes. "You should tell him…"

"Kaye we aren't even dating...we've known each other for a month!" She sighed loudly. She began to stare at the back of Thorn's head. "I can't just come out of nowhere and tell him I," she paused. She couldn't even say the word. She barely knew what love was, nevermind if she was actually feeling it. "...I can't do that...that's too soon...what if it pushes him farther away?"

"Look just...think about it okay?"

"I don't even know what it is Kaye...what does love even feel like? I've never loved anybody before…"

"Trust me Nik," Kaye rolled her eyes before tapping Nikki's thigh a few times. "You've got it bad. It's plain for all to see that you love him," she said quietly to avoid Nikki freaking out again.

"Yeah well," Nikki breathed out. "I'll think about it."

As their long bus ride drew on Nikki and Kaye eventually had no more energy left to speak. Nikki had concluded that Thorn had in fact fallen asleep almost as soon as they'd sat down and she was thankful he hadn't heard any of their conversation. Hazel had been busy the entire time trying to come up with gentle ways to keep Val from falling asleep. It was easy. She was exhausted and her head was still swimming. They heard her shift and groan uncomfortably every time they passed under a street lamp after the sun had gone down.

Nikki felt awful about it. If she had known that they were walking into a war zone she'd have tried to convince them to not take the job. She wasn't sure what good that would do though. As Kaye said, she wasn't their mother. They could do what they wanted but at some point, you have to wonder if these humans wanted to live or not. Hazel was one thing but Nikki thought Val should really take a step back and slow down. She had a kid and a husband, both of which were going to outlive her by hundreds or even thousands of years and yet here she was, chasing death when she didn't have to.

Of course, Nikki couldn't say that to her because she was busy chasing her own problems. Running around trying to please a boy who courted death and tore faeries to shreds between his teeth with no remorse. At least, none that he'd shown. He still slept restlessly on the bus but she couldn't help but reason that his sleepless nights had nothing to do with killing Faeries. In fact, she expected it was rather the opposite. He probably dreamed about Faeries killing his family...or even him. Or about being tortured by the Court of Teeth. Had he had bad run-ins with courts before this?

Had he been captured before by other faeries' he'd pissed off? She'd have to ask him. Try to dig to the bottom of his heart and pull all the shit out of him that he was holding onto. All the things that made him feel like he wasn't good enough. After a while, she realized that she'd been staring into the back of Thorn's head while she had been lost in thought.

"I need to tell him. "


	9. Chapter 8

We're crashing

Into the unknown

We're lost in this

But it feels like home

-Lifehouse, First Time

Chapter Eight

When the group was finally back in New York, they headed toward the coffee shop first and found Thorn's car where he'd left it. They all piled in and set Val in the backseat between Hazel and Kaye. It was a tight squeeze, being such a tiny car, but they managed to all fit in and Thorn drove them back to Val's place. When they arrived they found Ravus staring back at them in desperation in the doorway. "What happened," he let out, voice rough and Nikki thought he may have even been holding back tears. He rushed to the door and took Val from Thorn and lifted her up, one arm under her back and the other under her legs.

"I'm fine," she waved her hand absently, her voice dull and weak.

"Roiben asked us to the Court of Termites to trade favors," Hazel began. "Wanted us to help protect against a potential attack, which just so happened to come twenty minutes after we got there," Hazel rolled her eyes.

Ravus let out a low growl as he carried her to the hallway and to the right and lifted her up into her bed in the loft. He set back to his desk and began mixing things together in a chipped ceramic bowl before he Hazel spoke again. "Val hit her head when they blasted their way inside. She's at least got a concussion...can you fix it?"

"You don't just 'fix' a blow to the head in a few minutes," Ravus growled out, trying to keep his temper down. "She should've known better than to get mixed up in Roiben's bullshit," he said and Nikki was surprised at how human he sounded. Marrying one must have had a real influence on him.

"None of us would've made it out of there if Roiben hadn't asked Thorn to come as well," Hazel admitted and Ravus didn't spare him a glance.

"Seems Val rushes at the chance to be in your debt," he spat out and Thorn decided it would be better to not respond. Once he'd finished crushing up the ingredients and mixing them together he moved to the kitchen and ran water into the bowl before returning to mixing it. Once he was satisfied he moved to the loft and motioned for Hazel to join him. Once she had, he handed her the bowl and she climbed up into Val's bed and sat her upright against the wall and began spoon-feeding her the mixture. "Has she slept?"

"No, we wouldn't let her fall asleep."

"Good. Once she's eaten every bite of that she can sleep," he sighed through gritted fangs and returned to his desk. "Kaye, come here," he requested and she did as she was asked. Once at the table her lifted one green and long-nailed finger to her chin and tipped her head up to the light so he could get a good look at her stitches. "Who did this for you?"

"I did," she strained to say with her neck tilted up. "No one else was around to do it," she huffed. "I'm fine."

"Yes well," he began before grabbing a jar full of a whiteish paste from his desk and handed it to her. "All the same, take this. It will take the pain down but more than likely a scar is inevitable."

"Thanks," she sighed and took the jar from him before she headed toward the bathroom and disappeared.

Thorn and Nikki were the only ones left in the room with the troll now and Nikki was afraid that that was soon to change. Sure enough after only a few moments, Thorn pulled his cell phone from his overnight bag that he'd had stashed in the car and checked the time. "I'll go grab dinner for the rest of us," he suggested and Nikki wanted to object but she couldn't deny that she was starving. The sun had gone down over an hour ago and she was exhausted.

"I'll come with you," she offered but when he put his hand on her shoulder and shook his head she actually felt a bit of relief. She did want to spend time with him, but she wanted to sit down and collect her thoughts more.

"It's fine, you rest," he said and she was surprised when he leaned down and pressed a short kiss to her forehead. He dropped his bag in the entryway and headed back down to the car. Nikki, seeing the bag recalled that she had had her satchel bag up here as well and she quickly rifled through it to find her change of clothes she'd hastily packed that morning. When Kaye emerged from the bathroom Nikki slipped inside and changed into them. Fresh socks, panties, leggings and a hoodie. She'd neglected to pack a bra but she didn't much care at this point. The hoodie was baggy and it had been a seriously long ass day. She just wanted to relax.

When she emerged from the bathroom though she found Kaye at the table and she was not alone. There was a small, green-skinned boy sitting beside her in a Pikachu onesie and Nikki almost burst out laughing. If she'd had the energy she probably would have at the insane sight but she'd used up all her energy trying to ignore what had happened that day.

He had short black hair, decidedly much less oily than Ravus', big green eyes with gold flecks in them and barely any troll-like features. He just looked like a human boy tinted green with slightly oversized teeth. He sat beside Kaye shoveling cereal into his mouth with a plastic spoon, Pikachu hood still up and covering most of his head. When Nikki walked into the room the boy looked up to her and froze, mouth half open with a spoonful almost at his tongue. Kaye looked up to Nikki and motioned for her to come sit. "It's okay, she's one of mommy's friends," Kaye smiled down to the boy and pat his head gently. Nikki took the seat opposite of the boy and tried her best to give him a friendly smile. "This is Nicole," Kaye insisted and the boy just stared back at her nervously.

"Hi Trevor," she smiled as best she could. She hated the way he looked at her. Like he was a scared little human boy seeing a monster for the first time. At least he wasn't screaming or crying. "Nice to meet you."

"Hi," he said in a small and scratchy voice. He even sounded like a normal human boy. He began shoveling his food into his mouth again and Nikki was relieved when he lost his concentration on her. She found her vision flick to Kaye's throat, the thick trans-white paste glittering in the light of the kitchen.

"How did you do that anyway?" Nikki asked and pointed to her throat when Kaye looked to her. "Didn't it hurt?"

"Well yeah of course it did," Kaye smirked. Kaye lifted the corner of her shirt though and Nikki could see another scar on her abdomen, much older and turned white against her green skin. "Not my first rodeo. I've sewn up Roiben so many times at this point that I figured I should just do it myself."

"How did you keep your hand steady? I could barely sew up Thorn's shoulder when he got bitten without shaking."

"Well I used some magic to make it hurt less but honestly it's just cus I'm more used to this stuff than you are," she sighed and let her shirt drop.

"I hope I don't become used to it," Nikki sulked. "I've known him for a month and I'm already sick of watching Thorn do stupid shit for me-ooo," Nikki sucked in a quick gasp. "Sorry," she whispered.

"Hey, he's not my kid," Kaye shrugged and laughed and Trevor looked up from his cereal to Nikki.

"Don't say that word okay?" Nikki said softly and Trevor just gave her a strange look.

"Mommy says that word a lot. She gets mad at her video games," he said with a shrug and returned to his breakfast. Nikki just sighed in relief and Kaye had to laugh at her expense.

"You like pokemon?" Nikki asked, trying to keep the boy talking. She needed a distraction from the thoughts that were creeping up on her. The thoughts of the fact that she'd managed to kill another faerie.

"Mommy lets me play on her Gameboy," he smiled.

"Who's your favorite huh?"

"I like Snorlax," he said as he raised his hands above his head and bore his teeth and Nikki couldn't stifle her laugh. At least she knew which one that was. Figured it would be the big green one. "Castlevania is better though," he said and Nikki's lips parted to ask why before she realized that she'd been missing that information before.

Kaye noticed her expression and smirked. "She didn't," Nikki groaned and Kaye had to slap her mouth shut to keep from laughing too loud Incase Val had fallen asleep. "How did she get you to agree to that?" Nikki asked in confusion toward the living room where she received a grunt from Ravus.

"She didn't explain it to me beforehand," he said roughly but Nikki got the impression that he was amused with her reaction.

"Trevor Bellemont Russel," Kaye smirked. "He wants to be a vampire Hunter when he grows up, isn't that right?" Kaye teased but Trevor didn't miss a beat.

"Yup!" He smiled wide and set his spoon down in his empty bowl. "I'll be the best ever!" He giggled.

"Wait are...are vampires…?" She suggested quietly, not wanting to crush his dreams.

"Nikki you live with a werewolf...come on," she rolled her eyes.

"Really?! What ISN'T real?" She said as she gently slapped her hands down on the table.

Before Kaye could answer Hazel walked by the table and set Val's bowl in the sink before she walked back over and pulled out the last chair at the small table and sat down. "How is she?" Kaye asked quietly.

"She'll be fine in a couple days. The gash isn't so bad she just hit her head really hard," Hazel said as she ran her hand through Trevor's hair. "You hear that squirt? Go easy on your mom for a while okay?"

Trevor just frowned and nodded. That is until he saw a small twinge of light fly into the room from the window and settle onto Kaye's shoulder. Kaye jumped a little in surprise at first but after a moment Nikki saw her exhale in relief. "Hahhhh God Lutie you scared me. Where have you been?"

"Sorry," she squeaked softly. She tangled her fingers into Kaye's hair and Nikki began to think that it was more of a nervous tick than a habit. "I was still in your hair when that stupid fish pulled you into the water," she explained nervously.

"Oh gosh sorry I didn't mean to leave you there," Kaye frowned and held a finger up to Lutie, who wrapped her arms around it and rubbed her cheek into the green skin.

"I know," the little Sprite breathed out in a sigh of relief. "Lots of swimming. Wet wings," she said as she turned and her moth-like wings fluttered. "Took a while to dry out."

"Pfff," Kaye rolled her eyes. "You're telling me," she joked and Nikki watched as the red translucent wings on the pixie's back fluttered once.

"Can...can you actually fly?" Nikki asked with an eyebrow cocked.

"Yeah," Kaye smiled. "Of course."

"...No way, come on. Your wings are so thin," Nikki shook her head and Kaye laughed.

"I'll show you some time I'm sure," Kaye rolled her eyes again before they all heard footsteps coming up the stairs. In moments Thorn was at the dining table unloading three large brown paper bags filled to the brim with Chinese take out and Nikki forgot all about the thoughts she'd been fighting to keep down for the past few hours.

"Oh, here T," he said absently and pulled out a pack of unopened Pokemon cards from his pocket and chucked them on the table. The boy snatched them up quicker than Nikki could even identify what he'd thrown to the young troll and he had torn into the packaging in seconds.

"Thanks!" He yelled in surprise and began digging through them to see if he'd gotten anything good.

"Since when are you nice?" Nikki gasped without thinking before she slapped her hand over her mouth. The others and Thorn just laughed before he explained.

"Never come into a faerie's domain without gifts," he shrugged. "Or the gift may end up being you."


	10. Chapter 9

I've been looking for

Tears in the screen door

I've been waiting for

Another disaster

And I was kinda hoping you'd stay

-The Wonder Years, Passing Through a Screen Door

Chapter Nine

Sleeping bags were spread all over the living room floor. All the lights were out and Nikki thought she may be the only one awake. Ravus had taken Trevor to work with him for the night so that the rest of them could get some sleep. After all, Nikki and Thorn had been up since three in the morning and it was approaching midnight now. She was exhausted. Every inch of her body ached with overuse but she just couldn't fall asleep. Her mind was racing, trying to process all of the shit that had happened that day.

She'd had a fight with Thorn first thing in the morning, before sunrise even. Taken the train all the way here, gotten into a faerie battle where she'd insisted she'd never kill again, only to do so a second time right afterward. And now she was supposed to be asleep on Val's livingroom floor, underneath the Manhatten bridge, only a few feet away from Thorn. Kaye had been hurt because Nikki hadn't kept a good enough grip on her hand. She'd watched Thorn kill dozens of sea-folk without remorse or any hint of hesitation. She'd watched Kaye defend her home as if she were a knight and she'd watched Val fight despite having a concussion and bleeding so badly that one of her eyes had been covered in her own blood. 'Prince Valiant indeed,' she thought to herself silently.

Thorn had stood between her and a king of Faeries to keep her safe and he hadn't looked afraid at all. Yet here Nikki was, whining and moping through it all about her own problems. About how she hated the way she looked or how it made her feel like a monster when she killed Faeries in what was, textbook, self-defense.

But even when it's self-defense...you still get arrested.

You still go down to the station and they still put you on trial and you still have to prove that you killed somebody just so that they wouldn't kill you first.

There were no consequences for shoving a knife into a mermaid's throat. At least, none that Nikki had experienced thus far. Everyone told her she had done a good job and that she'd saved Kaye's life. Even back in the Court of Teeth, she'd saved her own life, though it had mostly been an accident. She just got lucky that not only did the troll cut himself on her horns that she'd forgotten she'd had, but also that they were poison-tipped and she hadn't known it until then.

She must be immune to her own poison if tearing up her own arm with them in Thorn's car hadn't killed her. Not to mention how lucky she was that she hadn't accidentally stabbed Thorn with them at any point. She'd thought she had once but clearly, it must have not broken enough layers of skin to affect him. She must have only grazed him.

She felt absolutely sick to boot. All she'd had all day was fast and cheap food and as she'd learned over the past month that was no good for faerie stomachs. All her old favorite foods had been cut out and she'd been having to cook decently healthy meals on a dirt-cheap budget. In one day she'd had a shitty take out breakfast, thrown it up, eaten another coffee house breakfast, pizza, and now her stomach was groaning and uneasy from eating far too much Chinese food.

She'd felt great after her shower but the feeling had worn off rather quickly. The post-sex euphoria, as she was now thinking of it as, had startled her at first because she had felt like a completely different person. Comfortable in her own skin for the first time since the night she'd spent with Thorn in the cabin in Maine. She'd felt in control despite teasing Thorn to the point that he had actually taken the initiative and their contact had been very different than it was the first time in the cabin. She'd let him dictate and yet she still felt completely in control of the situation the entire time.

Kaye's words about being some sex-crazed demon from a crappy anime rang through her head again. Could it really be that simple? Could that be why she longed for Thorn's touch almost constantly? And why it felt so good to tease him and to have his attention whenever possible?

The alternative was far more frightening if you asked Nikki. Because the only other possibility was that she actually loved Thorn. If she couldn't blame her body then the only other thing to blame was her heart. It would explain why she longed to be with him so badly. It would explain why, despite hating the way she sounded, she enjoyed singing to Thorn whenever he'd let her do so. It'd explain how every single time she'd gotten mad at him she'd silently forgiven him and moved on from it.

But why was that worse? Well, if she loved him, that meant she had to tell him. If she had to tell him then that gave Thorn the chance to tell her that he didn't feel the same way...or worse, that he did love her back. If he loved her then what was she supposed to do about it? Accept that he loved her and somebody else that he may never see again? Accept that every time he woke up in her arms with her singing to him that there was a fifty-fifty shot he'd call her by the wrong name? How long could she be okay with that? How long before being called Anya made her want to strangle him? How long until they started fighting and she left him in the dust just like Anya had.

How long until she ruined him.

She'd never loved anybody before. She didn't really know what it felt like. If she was feeling it now then, to be honest, she wished she could stop. Her stomach was in knots all the time. Her mind was never able to finish a thought without asking why Thorn wasn't laying closer to her. Why weren't they sharing a sleeping bag when they had grabbed each other like animals only a few hours earlier?

Then, of course, the sensible side of her mind would kick in and tell her that it was because they weren't alone. They were on Val's floor with their friends all around them.

Then the other voice in her head would speak back up and the cycle would start all over again. 'It's because you're a monster. A disgusting mess that no man would ever want to lay next to,' the thoughts came and went. 'You can't even pretend to be human without your necklace.'

She shook her head against her pillow. Tried to fight off the thoughts but she wasn't sure that she could keep it up. How long could she really go without confronting any of her problems?

Nikki was yanked from her thoughts by the sound of somebody shuffling around the room though. She turned over in her sleeping bag to find Thorn getting dressed. She watched him, lost in thought as he yanked up his jeans and started to pull on a t-shirt. She watched the way the muscles in his arms and back rippled and flexed in the unlit room, counting herself either lucky or cursed that she could still see him in the dark. She wasn't really sure which. She only spoke up once he pulled his hoodie over his head.

She was thankful that she had only to whisper, and that he had only to do the same. At least that part she figured wasn't a curse, that they could both hear better than a human could.

"Are you cold?" She asked, knowing full well that that wasn't the problem. Thorn didn't get cold for anything. When he'd finished straightening out the sweater he looked down to her.

"No I...left my phone charger in the car," he said and Nikki could tell he was lying. For someone who nature allowed to lie, Thorn wasn't very good at it.

"You can use mine, my phone's full," she said, sitting up and letting the sleeping bag fall away from her. Goosebumps flared across her dull grey skin as the cold air of the night surrounded her. They were in a mostly concrete room under a bridge after all. Not exactly her best choice to wear only a tank top and panties to bed tonight but that was just another one the voices fault. It had said to her that if Thorn did decide to crawl into her sleeping bag, it'd be better if she weren't wearing pants. She felt foolish for it now though as she quickly ran her palms down her thighs. When she stood from the floor she heard him heave a long sigh.

"Yeah okay...fine…" he muttered and followed her to the dining room table where her phone sat among others, hooked up to the charging cable. He handed her his phone and she plugged it in before she sat down and tapped the chair next to her. When he reluctantly sat down she scooted her chair quietly closer to his and rested her head into his shoulder.

"Why are you actually up," she breathed out, not sure what she was going to do with his answer. If he said what she expected then she couldn't yell at him. Not here. "I'd ask you to not lie to me but...I guess I would lie if I was going to sneak off in the middle of the night and not come back…" she said softly as she slipped her hand across his thigh and into his hand, brushing their fingers together. To her mild surprise, he actually didn't pull his hand away and she even felt him accept the gesture, entwining his fingers with hers.

"Nikki I'm going to come back…" he said softly. "I won't get hurt," he tried to explain but he felt Nikki laugh. It was a hollow laugh but it still shook her shoulders some.

"You're a shitty liar Thorn," she smiled softly before her lips drooped into a frown. "Why do you want to do this so badly," she asked as she looked back up into his eyes.

"Because you need it," he shrugged and Nikki had to clamp her teeth down on her lower lip to stop herself from yelling at him. She let out a long and silent breath before taking in a deep one again to try and stay calm.

"No I don't," she finally said. "I don't need it. I don't want it," she shook her head. "I've told you that already so I need to know why you feel like you have to go…did I enchant you to at some point to make you want to get the necklace? Tell me so I can take it away," she pleaded with him.

"No, you didn't," he said softly and reached his fingers to touch her cheek but she pulled away from him. She yanked her hand out of his and stood up, backing away from the table as he watched the panic streak through her face.

"So that's it then," she started, her voice wobly. She could feel her throat closing up again and once again, cursed herself silently for crying so easily. "You only want the necklace so I can be human. Because you hate me like this," she sobbed quietly and gestured to the crown of her head. "You need it because you can't stand to look at me as a faerie."

Nikki watched through tear-filled eyes as Thorn slowly stood up and took a step toward her and she grit her teeth, wanting so badly to slap him. But when he spoke it all dissolved away. Everything in the world melted away with his words as they wormed between her ears and settled in the pit of her stomach. "I need the necklace because YOU hate yourself like this…" he breathed out softly and Nikki froze. "And I just...want you to be able to look like what you want to look like...I want you to be free to choose…" he said and Nikki's tears began to flow down her cheeks as she stood there, dumbstruck.

"What?" She gasped out, barely audible.

"I want you to be free to choose how to live your life...as a human or...as a faerie. I want you to have the ability to disappear and live the life that you want...with or without all the bullshit that comes with being friends with...people like us," he said as he gestured around the room. "You deserve the choice...even if you don't want it."

Nikki couldn't think. Her mind couldn't settle on one thing at a time or react to anything Thorn said. She didn't know if that was because she was thankful or furious to find out that this is the way that Thorn thought of her. Even if it was her own fault for making him think this way. "I told you! I want you!" She growled out through her tears finally and he held a finger up to his lips. He crossed the room to her but she backed away from him again and into the kitchen. After a few more steps she felt the backs of her thighs press into the cold plastic of the refrigerator and was forced to stop while Thorn continued. He draped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her to him, pressing her tear-stained face into his shoulder. Nikki couldn't help but rub her face into the familiar fabric, the hoodie she'd been wearing most of the day.

When she had been apart from him all day, the scent stained into this fabric had helped to keep her sane. It had been as if he'd been there the whole time and even though she had been mad at him she'd been thankful for the comfort it provided. It kept her warm and kept her senses filled with Thorn even when she'd put over a hundred miles between them.

"Don't go," she pleaded as she latched onto the hoodie, gripping it right on his chest. "I don't want you to go," she sobbed and pleaded. "The last time you...it's not worth your life Thorn...not to me," she looked up to find him staring back down at her, her icy blue eyes connecting with his deep brown ones. "You...you owe me right?" She asked, trying her best to try and appeal to the way that Thorn thought. "Repay me by staying...please."

Thorn gave a heavy sigh and she felt his chest rising and falling in time with his breath. She could feel his heartbeat through his clothes and she was surprised by how calm it was. "Yeah okay...fine," he sighed and she felt his muscles relax.

Nikki drew in a deep breath to try and steady her aching heart when she felt his fingers thread through her hair. She closed her eyes and felt the pads of his fingers run along her scalp and now more than ever she was beginning to finally feel like she could sleep.

Now that she didn't have to worry about Thorn not being able to sleep or if he gave a shit about her or not. She felt him lean down, just a little and press a kiss to her forehead. It was gentle, so fleeting that she didn't even have time to wish that he'd kissed her lips instead. She was just too exhausted to care about where his lips had touched her, only that they had.

"Come on," he breathed out and led her back into the living room. He waited as she got back inside her sleeping bag before she felt him drop his bag beside her. He lay down on top of it and she felt his arm snake around her on the outside of her sleeping bag before she was dragged a few inches back on the floor until their bodies were pressed together. She was sad that they didn't have a bag big enough to share but compared to before this was already an incredible improvement. She could feel his warmth radiating through her sleeping bag after only a few moments and she relaxed back into it, trying as hard as she could to just disappear completely into his grasp.

She'd needed this. Over everything else, all the other problems she had been fighting with inside her mind melted away with Thorn's heat and her mind began to calm. The only thing she could think of was how tired she'd become. She'd almost been awake for twenty-four hours now and it had been a rough day at that. "Thank you, Thorn," she mumbled out, half asleep. She was so tired that when he responded, she hadn't even heard him. It didn't matter what he'd said, she had what she wanted and she was off to Dreamland in moments.

/

It was almost Noon before Nikki finally woke up. All around her sleeping bags were rolled up and vacant. She could hear snoring coming from the loft and figured it was far too deep and rough sounding to be any of the girls. When she sat up she found the living room empty and that everyone else was sitting around the dining table. None of them looked particularly well-rested and Nikki figured they couldn't have been up for too long before she was. When she stood she headed for the bathroom and found it vacant. She headed inside and began the process of washing up a little in the sink. Once she'd washed her face she tried her best to glamour down her more obvious features, like her eyebrows and horns. Once done she moved back to the living room and found something she hadn't expected waiting for her, partially covered by her sleeping bag. She felt the other's eyes on her as she pulled Thorn's hoodie from the floor and pulled it on over her head with a soft smile.

Once she turned to the group though, the smile left her lips as she found them all staring at her, their nerves all on display.

"What?" Nikki asked as she threaded her arms through the sweater and pulled it on straight. "What's wrong?" She asked as she walked up to the table and saw that there was a posted note stuck on the center of the table. Without even really looking she could see that it was signed from Thorn her hand snatched down to grab it reflexively.

"Nikki he…" Hazel began but stopped when she began to read the note. As her eyes scanned the small slip of paper the group surely noticed when she began to grind her teeth together before she crumpled the piece and chucked it against the wall. Nikki turned and stomped into the living room and began to pull her pants and shoes on before she grabbed up her bag, slung it over her shoulder and headed for the door. Before she got there though Hazel managed to catch her and grab her arm. She spun around with fury in her eyes but Hazel didn't look frightened at all. She looked calm and somehow that pissed Nikki off even more.

"Let me go," she growled fiercely, trying to wrench out of Hazel's grasp.

"Nikki please, he's been gone for hours you won't find him," Hazel pleaded before Nikki was able to work her arm out of Hazel's grasp.

"I don't care!" She shouted and Hazel opened the door herself and pulled Nikki out into the hallways before closing the door behind them.

"Look there's no sense in going and putting yourself in more danger! You can't stop him from doing this!" Hazel shouted back now that they weren't in danger of waking Ravus and Trevor.

"He lied to me! He said he would stay!" Nikki said as she balled up her fists. "Why does he get to make his own decisions but I don't?! You people all act like you own me and never let me think for myself!"

"We aren't telling you what to do!" Hazel argued back and Nikki could see her trying to hold back. "We give a shit about you and don't want you to get hurt! You don't know what you're doing, where you're going, and you don't know how to protect yourself. What are you going to do?"

"Stop him!" She shouted, "make him come back. I'll enchant him and drag his ass home if I have to. I told him not to go!"

Hazel's lips parted to begin yelling again but she seemed to stop as Nikki felt her eyes overflow with tears and snapped them shut before she wiped them into her sleeve. She was sick of crying, even tears of anger couldn't be shed right now. She needed to hold it in. "He's going to get himself killed for me and I don't want that!" She yelled hysterically, her voice cracking as she fought her feelings back. "I just want him to stop...why won't he stop," she sobbed, quieting down as she began to settle down.

"Because he cares about you and...because he's an idiot…" Hazel sighed before throwing her arms around Nikki. "He's doing what he can Nikki and...we can't take that away from him. He's doing what he thinks he has to do."

"But I told him," Nikki repeated as her bag fell from her shoulder and snagged on her elbow. "I told him I just wanted him here…"

"Come on...we need to talk about this," Hazel said as she turned back to the door and opened it. "This isn't something you need to do alone."

"...Okay," Nikki sniffled and tried to clear the tears from her face quickly. When they made it back to the table and sat down Nikki looked across the table to where Kaye was staring back at her. Lutie was perched on her shoulder and Nikki began trying to think of a plan to find Thorn as fast as possible. "Where would he go?"

"Well if he wants your necklace back he'd have to go to Elfhame. Seeing as Nicasia was there I'd have to assume that the High Court of the Undersea has the necklace," Kaye grumbled and Nikki saw her wince when she said the name. "He'd have to goad them onto land because there's no way he'd be able to get there."

"And where is...Elfhame?" Nikki asked, trying not to show her confusion.

"It's a series of islands off the coast of southern Maine," Kaye explained. "He's probably halfway there by now but I'm sure the holiday traffic will hold him up a ton."

"Holiday traffic?" Nikki blinked in surprise. She'd lost track of what day it was after the crazy day she'd had yesterday.

"New year's," Hazel answered and Nikki almost jumped. Had it really all gone by that quickly?

"Its...New Years Eve already? Alright then...well," she said slowly before she looked back to Lutie. "Lutie could I...make a deal with you?"

Lutie's head perked up and she looked to Kaye rather than answering. "Lutie works for the Court of Termites," Kaye smiled. "And the Court of Termites owes you greatly."

"What? Why me?" Nikki knew that Kaye's court owed Thorn but not why they would owe her as well?

"Because you saved my life...twice. So whether they like it or not, they owe you."

"You don't have to make a bargain with me in other words," Lutie confirmed in her small and whistful voice. "What can I do?"

"Can you try and catch up with Thorn? How fast can you fly?"

"Well, not THAT fast," she emphaisezed, "but I can get a bird to take me," she smirked and danced around with her arms spread out like wings on Kaye's shoulder. "What should I tell him?"

"Nothing," Nikki shook her head. "You just have to keep an eye on him and try to find a way to slow him down. Maybe find some way to let us know where he's gone if you can. Look out for the red string attached to his finger if that helps."

"You got it," she smiled and bolted toward the window. "Just let me out," she squeaked shyly. Nikki stood up and cracked the window open for her.

"Thank you," Nikki whispered and she saw Lutie giggle a little as she held her little hands up to her face.

"So human," she mused before disappearing out of the window and over the bridge.

"What about the rest of us?" Kaye asked as Nikki returned to the table.

"Well I'm...open to suggestions because I...actually have no idea how to stop him...even if Lutie catches him, we have no way to get there soon enough to stop whatever he's planning."

"He'll more than likely challenge a knight to a duel in order to win it back," Hazel chimed in. "So if he's able to offer up the duel before we get there then there's no way for us to stop him. They'll honor the challenge no matter what we do or say. We tried calling him but he won't pick up."

"He's probably afraid that I could enchant him to turn around through the phone…" Nikki thought out loud. "Is that possible?" She asked, directed at Kaye.

"Sure is," Kaye nodded, a hint of false shame in her face. "Enchanted a pizza guy once and he showed up with like fifteen pies," she smirked and was going to laugh until she realized it wasn't a very appropriate time for it. "Sorry," she sighed.

"Well...wait that might be a good idea…" Nikki said and Kaye gave her a strange look.

"How is fifteen pizzas a good idea right now?"

"No no," Nikki shook her head. "Enchanting people over the phone…" Nikki felt a scheming smile spread across her lips and snatched up her cell phone from her pocket. "I have an idea."


	11. Chapter 10

I don't blame you

for being you

But you can't blame me

for hating it

So say, what are you waiting for?

-Fall Out Boy, A Little Less Sixteen Candles A Little More Touch Me

Chapter Ten

"License and registration please," the officer said as Thorn rolled his eyes and reached for his wallet. What a piece of shit his car was. Probably had a tail light out or some crap like that. 'Mass cops will pull you over for anything,' he thought to himself as he handed over his license and leaned over to begin to dig through his glove box to find his registration.

While he was sorting through the papers the officer spoke again. "Where we headed today sir?"

"To see some friends in Maine," Thorn answered, mostly genuinely. It was only half a lie. They weren't his friends. Just acquaintances he'd met through jobs a few times.

Thorn finally found the right form and handed it to the officer through his window and the man skimmed it quickly. "Right, wait here please," he demanded and Thorn sat back in his chair while the officer walked back to his cruiser and stepped inside. He'd pulled Thorn over on the side of the highway and so far he'd given him no indication as to why. He hadn't been speeding...much, not nearly enough to make a difference anyway.

Thorn pulled his phone from the seat beside him and double-tapped the screen, the display lighting up and telling him he had over twenty texts and several voicemails. Better not listen to those, no matter how bad he felt...or how badly he wanted to hear her voice.

The texts he could peak at if he wanted to but what would be the point? His stomach was already churning at the thought of abandoning Nikki that morning when she'd expected to wake up beside him. It was only going to make it hurt more if he read them. He didn't regret his decision. He knew this had to be done but no matter how he sliced he felt like a real piece of shit this morning.

His skin was positively crawling, he felt so bad. He couldn't help but compare himself to Anya and every few seconds he'd have to twitch or shake his head, as if that would shove the thoughts away. It never did. At least he planned to come back. At least he wasn't leaving for good...without warning. He grit his teeth and shook his head again.

After waiting and waiting he finally heard the officer coming back up to his car. When he handed him back his documents the officer stayed silent. "Sssoooo why did you pull me over?" Thorn asked impatiently. He looked up into the officer's dull brown eyes and for a moment he thought the man looked drunk.

His eyes were a little glazed over and he seemed to be staring off into space more than at Thorn. "I need to search your car," was all the man said and Thorn squinted his eyes at the man.

"For?"

"Drugs," he said flatly and his hand went to Thorn's door handle. It didn't budge though as Thorn had had it locked.

"You need a reason for that. You've got no grounds to search my car. Tell me why you pulled me over," Thorn growled out, growing more and more suspicious as the man kept fumbling with his door handle. After a moment his hand came up and through Thorn's window and down toward the inside door handle so he could unlock it. Thorn grabbed the officer's wrist and spoke again. "Tell me why you pulled me over!" He shouted and the man seemed to snap too for a moment.

"Your car was put out for a missing person's complaint," he answered and seemed to realize what he'd been doing. Rather than going for his gun though, he simply kept trying to get his fingers to the lock on the inside of Thorn's door.

"You're enchanted," Thorn realized and the officer seemed to take no notice of the words.

"I need to keep you here," was all he said and Thorn realized that this was as far as his car was going to get him today. He reached into the backseat and grabbed for his backpack with his free hand. He began to stuff his phone and wallet inside before he let go of the officer's hand and shoved him back through the window and rolled it up before he could get his hand back inside.

Again, rather than reach for his gun, the officer simply began pounding his hand against the window while Thorn stripped off his shirt and hoodie. He stuffed them down into the bag and then unlocked his car door. Thorn looked back down the road for only a moment to see if any cars were coming in the lane beside them before he swiftly shoved his shoulder into the door and hit the handle with his fingers so the door shot out quickly and bashed into the officer. It knocked him backward and sent him onto his ass on the tarmack a few feet into the travel lane. Before he could get up Thorn was already out of the car and halfway to the trees that lined the highway. Once on his feet, the man began to run after him but on foot, he really didn't stand much of a chance of catching the wolf man.

Several yards into the forest and Thorn set down his bag before he stripped off the rest of his boots and the rest of his clothes and piled them into the bag. Black and grey fur was already growing out of his skin when he shoved the garments inside the bag. His bones began to pop and stretch in their sockets as he changed. He hunched over and in a matter of moments his joints were set and he was covered head to toe in fur, a long black tail grown out of his tail bone. When his transformation had finished he took the straps of the bag in his teeth and stood up, smelling for a moment before taking off through the snow.

Changing like that had always hurt but he was thankful deep down that the more he did it the more he became used to the feeling. He doubted it would ever not be painful but at least it wasn't pure agony like it had been the first few times he'd changed on purpose. As he ran he began to come up with a new plan. He couldn't very well run the rest of the route. If he did, the others could catch up with him and put themselves in danger to stop him. He needed to beat them there. He'd have to stop and get on the train or find a bus in the area once he'd completely lost the cops.

He was more than a little annoyed that he'd had to leave his car behind thanks to Nikki's little stunt. Enchanting the police to put out a search for him was a dirty tactic but he had to admit she'd had a good idea. It was brilliant really, and he was actually impressed deep down. He'd just have to cash in a favor to Kaye later to get his car out of whatever impound yard it ended up in. It wouldn't be the first time the car had been locked up. He often lost track of it on jobs for Faeries, whether he chose to transform into the wolf or if it happened by mistake.

When he transformed on purpose he was able to retain control, but if he was forced into it in a rage then he was as wild as any other wolf. Just far larger and a lot more dangerous. This had led to many a time when the car would be found abandoned, sometimes even with the doors still hanging open.

After what he figured had to be at least half an hour of running along the highway through the trees he paused to smell his way toward the nearest town. Once he found himself in someone's backyard he sat down and began the process of changing back. This process hurt far less but took much longer. When he'd finally returned to normal he pulled his clothes out of the bag one by one and put them back on before he slung the backpack over his shoulder and walked out of the Forest.

He could hear dogs barking from people's houses and backyards, no doubt they'd smelled him coming, but he ignored it and walked out onto the street before pulling his phone from the bag.

He searched up where he was and where the nearest bus and train stations were before deciding to take the closest bus stop. The train stopped too many times and cost too much. He'd still beat them there on the bus. Less of a chance of being caught on camera that way too.

He walked to the stop mapped on his phone and sat down before pulling out a candy bar from his bag and snacking on it to try and regain some energy. He counted himself lucky he'd tossed them in there after his last gas station stop rather than idly tossing then into the passenger seat. Transforming took a lot out of him and he hadn't had lunch yet. Not to mention all the running he'd just done. He checked the bus times and in the end, he'd had to wait for the second bus that showed up, else he'd have been headed in the wrong direction. He needed to get to Portland, and once he had waited another twenty minutes he'd boarded the bus and tried his best to ignore his grumbling stomach. His phone had been lighting up with texts the entire time and he'd barely managed to ignore them.

He was sure Nikki would be mad at him but he just couldn't let himself turn away from this. She needed this. The way she constantly put herself down. The way she looked at herself with disgust in the mirror each morning. If she needed to be human to be happy then Thorn would do whatever needed to be done to get that necklace back.

/

Nikki and Kaye sat on the train, both engrossed in their own phone calls to different police stations along the route that they thought Thorn would be driving. Hazel had stayed behind to look after Val. She'd tried to convince them to stay but it was no good.

Kaye had insisted that Nikki couldn't go alone so she'd tagged along and Nikki wasn't so sure if that was good or bad either. On the one hand, it meant she didn't have to be alone and that somebody would know if she got faerienapped. On the other hand...Kaye could be the one that got taken instead of her...or worse. They could both be killed or taken and then there would be chaos. All-out war between the courts would mean chaos not just for the folk, but for humans as well.

Kaye had told Nikki that this wasn't the first time the graveyard on the hill had been attacked. It had been even worse last time apparently. A tanker truck had been blown up, right on top of the graveyard and blown most of the hall to pieces. Lots of glamours got passed out that week to make people forget or to make them not notice when the court had rebuilt the place. There were a lot of empty graves there now, some of the bodies and caskets that had been in them weren't recovered but they'd done their best to put everything back where it had come from.

Some of the gravestones were recut and remade by Roiben's Smith and looked just a little too good compared to what they had been before. As Kaye finished her final call she set her phone down and looked to Nikki. When she'd finished she mimicked Kaye's actions with a much heavier sigh.

"So?" Kaye asked hopefully.

"He slipped away. An officer in northern Mass had him but I guess my instructions weren't specific enough. He ditched the car and got away on foot. He's a ghost in the wind now," Nikki shrugged.

"Well...it WAS a good idea," she tried to console Nikki but she knew it was useless. "He'll be a lot slower now. It's not like he can run the entire way you know? We'll catch up," she said and placed her hand on Nikki's.

"I hope so," Nicole sighed and rested her head against the window of their row. "He has to be okay. I can't let him do this."

"We won't," Kaye squeezed her hand. "You'll get to bring him home," Kaye said with a sweet smile. "Though I gotta say I'll miss you guys…"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you live pretty far away and...I don't know maybe Thorn will pick his work back up after this but...still, we won't get to see you very often."

"Well...I could always try and get Thorn to let me in on his jobs but you're right. He doesn't do much around where we live."

"Well...maybe you could convince him to move to New York?"

"Do you think he'd actually go for that?" Nikki rolled her eyes. "He's the most boring guy on the planet. New York is too busy for him."

"Well...where would you prefer to live?"

"Closer to you guys for sure...New York would be nice, to be honest. Hell if I wasn't so attached to that moron I probably would've moved there a month ago…"

"Well if you come, he'll probably follow."

"He isn't my pet," Nikki chuckled a little, thankful for the distraction of pleasant conversation. "Sometimes I kinda feel like it's the other way around, to be honest."

"How do you mean?"

"He's so much more...I don't know, I don't wanna say mature cus he isn't," she paused. "But he knows more about me than I do. Clearly, he understands me better than I do also…" she sank into the cushioned bench and scowled.

"Why do you say that? What'd he say?"

Nikki returned her vision to the window and watched the city buildings slide past them. "I thought he wanted to get me the necklace because he didn't like me like this...thought he only liked me when I looked human…"

"And?"

"He said that he wanted it because I only liked myself when I'm human...that it didn't matter to him at all…"

"...Do you really hate it that much?" Kaye asked as she slumped down into the bench to get to Nikki's head level.

"I thought I did but...knowing that he doesn't care one way or the other...it makes some part of me feel like shit for complaining about it so much. It makes me feel like he's out there doing this because he thinks he has to for me to be happy...I wish I had been able to tell him that…" she began but trailed off. She looked over to Kaye and began to study her glamour. Her green hair had turned more blonde with green streaks in it as if she'd dyed it weeks ago and it was washed out. Her pupils were no longer split, instead just a regular old brown Iris and black pupils like a human girl. Her skin was a bit tanned, not nearly as pale as Nikki's. She looked positively normal.

She really could have a normal human life if she wanted to. Kaye's necklace was just like hers after all. "So...your necklace came from the Seelie Queen right?"

"Silarial, yeah," Kaye confirmed and looked up to the ceiling. She and Nicnevin were actually sisters," she breathed out before her eyes widened and she looked back to Nikki with surprise written on her face. "Huh," she huffed.

"Huh? What?"

"If you really are Nicnevin's daughter...and I mean...you're like, spitting image so you must be...you and I might be...cousins...faerie cousins?" She shrugged.

"What do you mean?" Nikki asked as she sat up.

"Well, I don't know where I came from. I don't even know my own name. I stole Kaye's name and made it my own. You are kind of the same way except Nicnevin must have just broken down her own name to give you. A human one."

"And? How does that make us cousins?"

"Well when I got Kate back from the Seelie Court Silarial said something to me that's...always kinda eaten away at me."

"What did she say?" She asked as Kaye sat up to look at her.

"You belong with us, in the bright court. This is your true home, or some nonsense like that," she thought. "She was the one who posted Lutie and her friends to watch over me as a kid too. Strange that she'd have three faeries watching out for some random pixie changeling...so I...kinda developed this theory that I might be Silarial's daughter."

"No shit," Nikki blinked in thought. "Well if that's true then you're the only family I've got…" Nikki smiled softly before the gesture faded and her lips pressed into a frown.

"Hey," Kaye said as she squeezed Nikki's hand gently again. "I'm not going anywhere," the pixie sighed with a smile. "You aren't going to lose me too."

Nikki looked back out the window before speaking again. "What's...what's it like having a human family?"

"Well," Kaye sighed as she sat back in their seat. "It wasn't easy telling Ellen that I wasn't human. The first time she saw me she flipped. Thought that I had stolen her real kid away."

"That's awful...but I guess I can see why she'd assume that."

"I don't blame her at all…" Kaye said as Nikki slowly turned her attention back to Kaye. "I did something really stupid to get Kate sent back to Ellen and when that happened I think she kinda paused...had a moment of clarity or something. The next time I saw her I tried to run but she told me to stay. Threw on the mom voice, used my full name, whole nine yards," Kaye laughed.

"How old were you?" Nikki asked, surprised at how long ago it seemed like Kaye was talking about.

"Sixteen, I mean...allegedly," Kaye shrugged. "Hard to say. Anyway, she convinced me to stay and that she was sorry she'd freaked out. She raised me after all. She had me for sixteen years and in all that time Kate still looked like a little kid. So when she got her back she was pretty easy to mold back into a...mostly normal girl," Kaye winced.

Nikki remembered how her first interaction with Kate had gone that day at the coffee shop and shivered at the thought of how thirsty she'd seemed for Thorn. "Need to find a way to label Thorn as mine," she thought aloud and Kaye laughed.

"I wouldn't look too much into that. Yeah she's got a little crush on Thorn but it's not because she actually likes him as a person. She's just obsessed with supernatural guys. She'd take anything she could get as long as it wasn't human."

"Oh," Nikki sighed in a bit of relief.

"She actually loved her time in faerie land and...well it was really hard to separate her from it. It only lasted so long. Soon as she was allowed out of the house on her own she was visiting the shop. She knows what to look for in a person to see if they are wearing glamour. Knows to look out of the corner of her eye to get past it. I was constantly worried she'd get snatched up again but...I'm not her mother," Kaye shrugged.

"Your mom doesn't care if she works at a coffee shop for faeries?" Nikki gasped.

"She did at first and...I'm sure she still worries about her but...you know," Kaye's shoulders drooped. "She may look your age but she's not. She's a grown-ass woman and she can do whatever she wants. If working at the shop means I get to keep a set of eyes and ears on her all the time to make sure she's safe then well...we'll take that over nothing."

"I guess that's good. What would I even do if I moved to New York though?" She asked, changing the subject.

"Well like you said you could work with Thorn or just get a normal job. Hell, I could tell Corney to hire you at the shop," she shrugged. "They did just lose me and I doubt they've filled the gap yet."

"Wait...you'd do that for me?" Nikki asked in surprise. "You'd really let me work at your shop?"

Kaye squinted at how taken aback Nikki was. "Why wouldn't I?" Kaye smiled. "They need another employee. The crew is small so you'll get forty hours or whatever you need. Making tea and coffee isn't that hard," she listed off the items on her fingers before she smirked and elbowed Nikki gently in the hip. "And we could always use another smiling pretty girl behind the counter," she laughed and Nikki snorted through her nose at the statement. "Unfortunately glamour is required while out in the shop. But whenever you go in the back you can take it off."

"That's fair I guess...I wouldn't wanna scare all the customers away," Nikki laughed before she felt her cheeks warm up. "Thanks, Kaye…"

/

Once Thorn had made it to Portland he'd begun asking around town to find out where one of his past commissions lived. He'd never met her at her apartment, always in public and she hadnt ever given him a number to call. He wasn't even sure she had a phone at all. He'd been careful and watched the map on the city on his cell phone so as to avoid any police stations and kept his hood up the entire time. He could tell no one was following him at the moment but he couldn't lose focus and let somebody slip through the cracks.

He made his way to where he'd met her one time, where she'd explained the job to him. She'd asked him to watch over her human girlfriend while she was back home in Elfhame. It had been an easy job. She'd never even known he was there but all the same, the elven girl owed him all the same.

It was a small coffee shop, much smaller than Moon in a Cup, and it didn't take more than a few words to convince the cashier to tell him if she knew where the girl lived. It turned out that she did thankfully. Apparently the girl Thorn had been commissioned to keep an eye on worked here part time and her co-workers seemed to be loud mouths. They told her where the girl had been staying and that, at least for a while, she'd been staying there with the elf girl he was looking for. At least he had a place to start.

When he finally found his way to the desired apartment building he found a girl sitting on the front steps of the building alone. The old brick building was several stories high and no doubt held several apartments. She had long and wavy brownish red hair and bright brown eyes. She was dressed in pretty normal human clothes too, boots, a zip-up jacket, and blue jeans but something was off about her. She was zoning out so hard that she hadn't even noticed Thorn padding up their walkway. She smelled like…' rowan berries,' Thorn raised an eyebrow. She smelled like a faerie, not human at all, but he couldn't spot any flaw in her glamour anywhere.

"Vivien?" He asked and the girl's head bolted upright. She stood up, kicking off the step and lowering herself before she reflexively held up her fists.

Thorn stood, trying his best not to react. Best to not mirror the gesture and start shit he didn't need. "Or not," he whispered.

"Who are you," the girl demanded. "What do you want."

"I came to ask a favor of Vivien. I heard she may be living here. Taller girl, dirty blonde with pink highlights," he gestured to his hair and waited. The girl seemed to calm down and take a step back. "You know her? Kind of in a rush."

"Look Vivi...isn't doing so great right now okay?" The girl sighed as she sat back down on the porch. "Can it wait?"

"No, it can't. She owes me and I'm here to collect," Thorn said sternly, growing impatient. "I don't really care if she's in a shit mood or not."

"Well...maybe I can help you?" The girl suggested.

"And you are?" Thorn asked skeptically.

"I'm her sister…" she explained softly, looking around as if she were paranoid or under surveillance. She gave a heavy sigh before standing up again and walking to him where she held out her hand.

"My name's Jude."


	12. Chapter 11

I'm sorry I don't laugh at the right times

Is this what it feels like with my wings clipped?

I'm awkward & nervous

I'm awkward & nervous

-The Wonder Years, There, There

Chapter Eleven

"Alright," Thorn shook her hand. "Hell of a glamour you've got on," he sniffed at the cold winter air.

"Oh no...I'm not," she breathed before trailing off. "I'm not like her," Jude finally finished. One didn't need to have superhuman hearing to detect the massive disappointment in the words as she spoke them.

"Well Jude, that means that unfortunately, you cannot help me," he sighed and his attention snapped to the door as he heard someone coming through the front room. Jude turned to look, wondering what had grabbed his attention. She hadn't heard anything at all. When the door opened Jude found Vivi standing in the doorway wearing her PJs and the weakest glamour she'd ever seen in her life.

Something about the sight made Thorn want to laugh but he thought it best to hold that emotion in right now. She looked terrible. Thorn didn't make a habit of keeping a list of girls he was attracted to after Anya left but if he did, Vivien Duarte would have been on that extremely uncrowded list. Fair skin that only a faerie could have, white but slightly sunkissed had turned pale. Her make up, which she insisted on doing manually for reasons he wasn't pricey too, was smudged and runny and it looked like she hadn't slept in days. Stark contrast to the PJ's that, of course, Thorn could smell from here, she'd been in for probably a week.

He could see traces of the girl he remembered dealing with though. Her pointed ears that, unlike Nikki's and Kaye's, didn't point straight up but rather fanned out and backward from her head more. With out much sun getting to her skin these days, the freckles on her cheeks had filled slightly but they were still there. They were on her chest too, much more lightly though. Even disheveled as she was, this faerie girl was pretty. She didn't have the body shape that Nikki or Anya did that Thorn liked more than he'd ever admit but...pretty WAS the word.

"It's okay Jude...he's a friend," She croaked and it was just as easy to hear as it had been too see that she'd been crying only moments earlier. Her eyes were bloodshot and her voice was horse. "Thorn," she said softly before he nodded his head slightly. She was silent for a long while before she sucked in a breath from her nose and wiped her face into her sleeve. "Would you like to come in?" She asked softly and Jude turned back to him.

"No, thank you though, I'm in a bit of a hurry," he shrugged and glanced over his shoulder to see if anyone was watching them.

"I heard," she nodded solemnly. He thought she may actually look a little hurt at his refusal. Like she could actually use a friend to talk to, but that wasn't what he was here for. "How can I repay you?"

"I need a ride to Elfhame and you're the only person I can ask at the moment," he sighed. "Hate to waste a favor like this but sometimes that's how it is," he said and Jude whirled around to Vivi.

"What? What did he do for you?" She asked incredulously. She couldn't believe she hadn't known that Vivien of all people had been making deals with strangers without her knowing about it.

"Thorn…" she began softly before disappearing behind the door. When she reappeared to them she had put slippers on and she walked out of the building and down onto the lawn, her slippers crunched on the leftover snow from the previous day as she went. Vivi began to walk behind the building and the two followed her. "He kept an eye on...Heather for me a few times while I was stuck at home with you and Taryn…" she blubbered and Thorn was beginning to put the pieces together and Jude groaned.

"Why do you need to get to Elfhame? What could a human possibly want there?" Jude asked him and Thorn could hear the anger in her voice. Holding a grudge against someone, that was for sure.

"I'm not human," he answered flatly and watched as Vivi picked the stalk of a weed from the lawn. Ragwort, he thought it might be. There were stalks all over the place sticking up through the snow. Vivien had discreetly planted it all over the lawn of the apartment complex and had been using her magic to keep them growing through the winter. Jude looked skeptical as her eyes moved up and down Thorn's body several times.

"You don't have a tell?" She murmured. "Not a faerie?"

"Werewolf," Vivi remarked and Thorn chuckled when Jude took a cautious step back from him.

"Gods Vivi, you couldn't ask anybody else to watch after her?"

"They all wanted cash," she shrugged her shoulders. "Or worse. Thorn deals in favors," she sighed before lifting the weeds to her lips and whispering to them softly. In moments they were growing and changing shape until the familiar shape of a ragwort winged steed stood before them, snorting out billows of steam into the cold winter air. "You sure you wanna do this tonight? Don't you have somewhere you'd rather be? It's new years eve?" Vivi asked him.

"I do but...I can't see her again until this is done. So I gotta get it done," he shrugged as he pulled himself up onto the horse's back and grabbed onto one of its many vines to steady himself. "Your debt to me is paid Vivien," he exhaled, trying to keep the regret clear from his voice. "Pleasure doing business. Sorry things...didn't work out."

"It's my own fault…" she said softly and he watched as she wrapped her arms around her waist.

"Well...if you ever need anything else done, you know how to reach me." He said before nodding his head toward Jude.

"Same goes for you," he said and Jude barely acknowledged his words before turning to Vivi. He watched as she pulled her sister into a hug before he flicked the vine and the horse took off, flapping it's great leafy wings hard to kick into the air. He was gone from them in moments and out above the sea in less than a minute.

He counted himself lucky that he'd managed to steal his hoodie back from Nikki before leaving. It was absolutely freezing. Even Thorn had to admit that he was a little cold up here.

/

Nikki's teeth began to chatter as she huddled closer to Kaye. She'd wrapped her arms around the pixie girl for balance at first but now it was for warmth. They'd gotten off the train somewhere in New Hampshire near the coast and Nikki wasn't really sure why. Kaye had leaned down to pick some weeds up from the snowy earth. Once they'd found an empty park Nikki had finally asked her what they were doing.

Kaye had told her that she could turn the stalks of weeds into a horse for them to ride and Nikki wasn't sure at first if it was a joke or not. When the horse actually appeared before them she'd stood there, dumbstruck not only from the fact that she wasn't kidding, but that the horse also had wings.

"Why couldn't we do this back in New York?!" She'd whined, wondering why they hadn't flown the whole way.

"They only last a little while, we weren't close enough," Kaye had explained. Now they were up above the waves and freezing their asses off in what Nikki realized now more than ever were far too few layers of clothing. She was trying her best to concentrate so she could do for them as she'd done for Thorn when they'd taken an accidental dip in the frozen lake last month. It took her several minutes to get the spell stable but once she had she felt Kaye relax in her arms, her back pressing into Nikki's chest as the imaginary heat bounced between them.

"Hoooo that feels nice" the pixie sighed. Nikki knew of course that they were still cold in reality, but tricking their brains into thinking otherwise would have to do for now. Nikki had her face buried between Kaye's shoulder blades, not just because of the bitter wind, but because she had only just learned that she wasn't very fond of heights. She'd never been on a plane or a roller coaster before and now that she found herself a hundred feet off the dark black waves of the night covered ocean, every inch of her body ached for the solidness of the ground they'd left from. She hated the way the horse slowly rocked up and down beneath her as it flapped its wings. It made her feel sick.

When the islands that Kaye had been steering for finally came into view she was so thankful that she could've kissed the earth itself. Moments after they landed she was on her knees in the snow trying not to throw up and Kaye was too busy dismissing the spell to comfort her.

As soon as the steed had shrunk back down to a whithered up weed Nikki felt something small land on her shoulder and begin nuzzling into her cheek. She jumped visibly and turned over, butt sinking into the snow. She had to keep herself from twitching as she felt soft wings dust against her throat.

"You made it!" The tiny voice said and Nicole couldn't help but to scold the little Sprite.

"You really gotta warn me before you do that. One of these times I'm going to accidentally crush you like a fly," she shuddered through gags.

"Sorry," Lutie moped but continued to rub her tiny cheek into Nikki's.

"Did you find him?" She asked as she slowly stood back up against a tree.

"He's already here. Nearly at the palace last I saw him," her shaky voice managed to say. I tried to slow him down but he wouldn't listen.

"Come on, we gotta get moving if we are gonna convince him to stop before there's no turning back," Kaye said as she hustled to Nikki's side and took her hand. The pair took off through the snow and headed in the direction that Lutie suggested. She and Kaye had at least been here before so they knew where they were going. Thorn, hopefully, did not.

The trio headed through the trees and over snowy hills until they could see the castle peeking up over the edge of the Forest. Once within sight, the pair found the gate guarded by knights and Kaye stepped up to speak to them before Nikki had a chance to try.

"What's your business," one knight demanded and they stopped and Nikki tried to mimic Kaye's movements as she bowed deeply.

"I am Kaye, of the Court of Termites, consort of King Roiben. I come to...plead with King Cardan for a friend's safety."

Nikki could tell that she was picking her words carefully so as to not reveal too much. "The King has more pressing matters than your friend," the Elvin knight bit off the words condescendingly and forced Kaye to try a different angle.

"The Court of Termites was attacked today by Queen Orla's forces. This is an act of war by association of our Court and King Cardan," she said sternly and Knight's face changed completely to one of panic.

"Escort them in," he relented and the other guard turned to the massive double doors and guided them through into the entryway of the palace. Kaye knew it wasn't her place to be the bearer of this news, especially since she didn't know if Roiben had wanted to tell the High Court at all, nevermind tell them himself. They would find out eventually, either way, she reasoned and she grabbed Nikki's hand again to lead her through the halls of the palace with their Guard keeping watch over them. When they arrived in the main hall where the Throne sat at the back wall they found a massive crowd gathered.

"A revel," Kaye asked to no one, incredulously. "Really? Now?!" She yelled a bit and felt Nikki squeeze her hand.

"New Year's Eve," Nikki breathed out cautiously. Her eyes were darting all over the room. She could hardly focus. There was music and laughter and the noise and movement of the sea of faeries drew her attention away from her goal. There were so many beautiful colors and dresses and embroidered armor that she began to worry that they would stick out too much. They were dressed like humans after all, but Kaye didn't seem bothered by it.

Kaye refocused and turned her attention to the throne where the King. He had a clear glass goblet filled with wine looking almost completely uninterested in everything but the glass.

"Well he doesn't look very interested in this party," Nikki commented.

"You're right…come on," she sighed and began yanking Nikki through the packed room, past courtiers and Knight's alike. The faeries around them couldn't help but comment on their appearance but Nikki was far too concentrated, scanning the crowd for Thorn, to notice. When they'd finally reached the raised deus that the throne rested upon Kaye had to yell above the crowd. "Your majesty!" She shouted and The King glanced down at her, despondency all over his face.

Nikki looked up into the King of Faerie's face and was taken aback at how beautiful he was. His lips were painted black to match his surprisingly unkempt hair. It hung loosely around his neck and had started to curl at the edges. It was at least pushed out of his face and held down by the golden crown that hung around his head, rested on his ears. Ears which, as expected, came up to a thin point. His cheekbones were high and his dark eyes were lined with a dull and matte purple tinge. Nikki couldn't tell if it was makeup or glamour, or even the lack of either. He looked like he hadn't slept in days but somehow he managed to make that look beautiful. He wore a black coat and pants to match that were lined with gold and earrings and rings to match his crown. If Nikki was being honest he reminded her of Thorn, if Thorn were faerie that is. Or if he dressed nicely for that matter.

"You," he pondered for a moment before he looked down at her necklace. "The Pixie from the Court of Termites. I received your gift," he smiled absently.

"Thank you for accepting it," she bowed quickly, trying to hurry the conversation along.

"You seem...different," he squinted at her through his mild drunkenness before tracing a line down his cheek and throat with his finger nail.

"We need to have a word with you, if we may," Kaye answered as she nodded.

"And so you will," he sighed as he stood and stepped down from his chair to meet them, "As it happens I was wishing for an excuse." He led them out of the main hall and to a quiet stairwell at the edge of the room.

"I do not know if they acted in Queen Orla's interest or not, but The Undersea attacked the Court of Termites this afternoon," Kaye whispered and Nikki saw the King freeze up. "They were led by your little friend," Kaye growled out and the girls saw him swallow hard. Even Nikki could tell that Kaye's words had shocked him and made him nervous. He really was new to this after all.

"Nicasia?" He asked, blinking some of the drunkenness away.

"She's the one that did this to me," Kaye pointed and he shook his head, trying to sober up. She knew he was in no condition to deal with this. "King Cardan, where is your senishal?" Kaye asked impatiently. "The human girl? She could deal with this if you need to be present at the revel?"

"I need to be present where my best interests lie...right now that is here," he explained before running a hand through his black hair. "Jude…" he whispered the girl's name sweetly. Nikki could see longing spread across Cardan's face. Longing she knew all too well about. "She was banished from these lands by...the crown."

"You banished her?" Kaye asked in surprise. "Funny, I thought you were…" she began but hesitated as she remembered her place. "Anyway. I didn't come here to seek revenge for the Court. I'm sure Roiben's wrath will be revenge enough," and Kaye smirked at some wordplay that Nikki thought she might not posses the context for.

"Then why come all this way? On tonight of all nights."

"All nights?" Nikki asked.

"Queen Orla is on her way here," he said as he smashed his hand against his face and began rubbing at his eyes. "Some human came in and asked me to preside over a duel. Presumptuous fellow. Apparently, someone summoned a ragwort steed for him to cross the sea."

Nikki shuddered. He'd beaten them here after all. "Where is he now?" She demanded and Kaye's eyes snapped to her, scolding her silently. "Sorry...please," she asked quietly and Kaye rolled her eyes before looking back to Cardan.

"Please excuse her," Kaye bowed her head.

"New to this?" He asked with a raised eyebrow and Nikki nodded slowly. "Lucky for you I am...not feeling myself lately," he murmured. "I can have a ward show you to him."

"Thank you, your majesty," Kaye bowed generously before grabbing Nikki's hand and dragging her down as well.

"Uh," she said as she fell into a sloppy bow with Kaye. "Yes, thank you, sir," she said and heard Cardan sigh.

"I fear your thanks are premature and...undeserved. Had I known the full situation I'd have never agreed to his request."

The girls looked up to him in confusion. "Why's that?" Kaye asked as they stood back up.

"Because the terms of the duel have already been set," Cardan answered, turning away from them to avoid seeing Nikki's lips part and begin to tremble. "And I somehow doubt you will like them…"

/

Thorn stood still. Holding himself in an upright position as stifly as he could. He knew what was coming and he knew he deserved every second of it. He watched as Nikki stomped across the room right up to him and closed his eyes tightly, grabbing at the edges of his pant legs to keep his hands from coming up to defend himself. After another long breath of anticipation Nikki's clenched fist collided with his jaw and his head snapped to the side while she reared back and punched him again, this time in the stomach.

"You asshole!" She screamed at the top of her lungs, tears streaming down her face. When a third blow didn't come he opened his eyes and found that Kaye was holding her back, one hand on her wrist and another around her stomach. He watched as Nikki continued to fight, trying to get out of Kaye's arms as she cried and flailed around. Eventually though, the energy just wasn't there anymore a d she watched Thorn with her teeth grinding together and tears dripping from her chin. "How could you…" she sobbed. "How could you agree to that!"

Thorn stood back up straight and Kaye finally let Nikki go. He brought his hand up to his chin and rubbed his palm into the bones she'd connected with before stretching his lower jaw out. "It's my life Nikki," he shrugged. "It's mine to gamble with," he said calmly.

"No, it's not!" She cried back at him and took a step back toward him. Kaye went to follow her but Thorn shook his head at her. Nikki's hands came up and grabbed at his shirt, "It's mine. You owe it to me and I!" She began before slamming her fist against his chest. "I didn't want you to do this!"

Thorn stayed silent for a long while as Nikki continued to break down and cry until she finally let her hands drop to her sides. "Say something," she sobbed.

"Thorn, why did you agree to this," Kaye asked and he looked to her, finding her staring down at the floor. "What made you think that this is what you needed to do?"

"They wouldn't accept the duel unless it was to the death, and unless they got something out of it if they won…" he sighed and draped his arms across Nikki's shoulders and pulled her closer to him. "They can't have it. These amulets are worth starting wars over. There's no way we could let them keep it and the rest of you weren't willing to act."

"I don't want it-" Nikki croaked up to him but he cut her off.

"Whether you want it or not. I can't let them keep it. This isn't just about us," he looked down into her water filled blue eyes. "A full-on war like this could affect humans even more than it would affect the folk."

"You act like human wars haven't done the same thing," Kaye rolled her eyes.

"Sure they have. I'm only doing what I am capable of doing Kaye," he shot back at her and she silently nodded her head.

"You have to win," Nikki sobbed before wiping her face in her own sleeve as she pulled away from him. "If you lose I swear to God Thorn. I will find a way to bring you back to life and then kill you myself," she shouted at him.

"I wouldn't worry about that," he smirked and walked away from her toward a weapon rack that had been set up for him to choose from by the King's servants.

"You're not a knight Thorn," Kaye scolded him. "Why would you agree to fight fair?"

"Can't assume that they won't change the terms when Orla gets here. I have to assume the worst," he shrugged before settling on a long wooden spear with a short double-edged blade affixed to the end.

"Why that?" Kaye asked as she watched him swing it around, impressively quickly she would say.

"Two-handed," he said. "Like a hockey stick," he smirked. "Should be easier to handle for me than a sword. As you pointed out I am no knight. Haven't the faintest idea how to use a sword properly."

"That's...fair," she shook her head. "Forgot you played," she said softly before she studied Nikki for a long moment and turned to leave. "I'm gonna...go wait outside okay?" She asked and Nikki turned to her suspiciously. Kaye motioned for Nikki to stay though and with that, she was out the large wooden doors and she was alone with Thorn.

They were both silent for what felt like ages, each one of them unable to find the will to look the other in the eye.

"You...played hockey?" Nikki asked quietly, trying to focus on the new subject. If she thought about Thorn risking his life for her anymore she was going to puke.

"Couldn't afford men's league this year," he answered casually as he turned the weapon over in his hands. "Not to mention my injuries." Nikki looked around the room, trying to find any excuse to focus her eyes on anything other than him. She found a seat at the edge of the room by a fireplace and paced to it, arms wrapped around herself. When she sat down she let out a long sigh to try and steady her ragged breaths.

"Oh," Nikki sighed, trying her best to stop sobbing. She heard his heavy work boots on the marble floor as he crossed the room and came to rest beside her chair. "Thorn…" she breathed out her voice hitching. He came around the chair and sank to his knees before her and she very quickly became lost in his eyes. What had she wanted to say?

"I'm sorry Nikki but...I have to do this."

"Why did you have to lie to me about it," she finally managed to ask. "Do you not care at all? That I expected you to be there when I woke up?" She asked and she saw shame wash over his face as his eyes dropped to the floor. "Does nothing I say or want from you really matter?"

"Of course it does…" he breathed, still focused on the floor.

"Then why won't you just listen to me," she pleaded. "Why did you feel that this was the only way to show me that you cared."

"Because the alternative was far more terrifying than some silly duel…" he said as his eyes finally came back up and locked with hers. "Because the alternative was waking up next to you…"

"Fine," she sobbed and moved to stand. She had gotten the answer that she'd wanted after all. She'd been waiting a month for Thorn to tell her that he wanted nothing to do with her and there it was, just like she'd asked for. She turned to walk away but felt his hand grab hold of hers. He pulled her back around and she brought her hand up, fist clenched to deck him again but he caught the blow in his free hand, before pulling her to him. Their bodies crushed together as he pressed his lips to hers and her arms went slack.

The only thing she'd wanted more than for him to tell her to leave was this. For Thorn to kiss her first. For him to make the first move. To give her a sign he wanted her there. When he broke the kiss she was so dazed she barely heard him. "The alternative is letting myself love you…and that's far more terrifying than any stupid faerie curse, or Duel…" he breathed into the skin of her neck and the words made her shiver. His breath on her neck could be blamed partially for the tingling sensation that pounded down her spine but she knew it was more than that. "You...scare...me…" he said again and she felt his grip on her hands tighten, like he didn't want her to go. Like he was afraid that his words would drive her away.

She had to admit, despite his touch, every cell her body wanted her to run. She wasn't ready for this. This was the very last thing that she expected from him and she was scared to death of the words that might leak out of her mouth if he kept talking like this. "Because I'm a monster?" She breathed.

"Because I like it," he said softly and her breath caught in her throat. "Because I like the things you do and...I like the way you make me feel...you make me feel wanted again. And that terrifies me." Nikki's breath finally began to slow and after a moment she pressed her lips back to his. She wanted him so desperately that she couldn't even think. For the first time though, her desires felt different. She just wanted him to hold her like this and nothing more. No voices eating away at her. No doubts that he wanted her gone.

"You are wanted...I...I want you," she buried her face in his shoulder and felt his arms gro around her shoulder blades. "I…" she quietly blubbered. She wanted to say it but could she really do it. "Thorn...I," she began again but her voice dried up in her throat again.

Before she could get the words out though, a page came to the door and called for them. "The Court is ready for you."

"I'll be fine," he smiled and Nikki couldn't tell if he'd faked it or not.

"Okay," she breathed out, trying as hard as she could to believe him. He leaned down and kissed her one more time but somehow...this kiss felt different than the rest had. She couldn't put her finger on it but something was different. It wasn't carnal. It was gentle. His lips felt softer than normal and it didn't feel like they were trying to use their lips to convey what the rest of their bodies wanted. She couldn't remember where or why, but she'd been kissed in this way before.

She wasn't able to figure it out before they were led out of the room either.


	13. Chapter 12

And I will stumble and fall

I'm still learning to love

Just starting to crawl

Say something, I'm giving up on you

I'm sorry that I couldn't get to you

Anywhere, I would've followed you

Say something, I'm giving up on you

-A Great Big World, Say Something

Chapter Twelve

When they reached the main hall, Nikki's mind was still stuck on the kiss. It wasn't rough like their kisses had been thus far. It was soft and fleeting. It felt different than any of the kisses they'd shared in the short time they'd known each other. She couldn't tell what it made her feel and before she could ask he was away, walking toward the door and the girls were following him back toward the Great Hall. Nikki saw Kaye scan the room quickly before she let out a low groan and frowned. "That bitch didn't show up," she grumbled.

The crowds had parted to either side of the room and the procession of the Sea-folk had already ceased. As the girls found a place to stand where they could still see the center of the room they heard whispers running through the crowd, starting from the sea-folk themselves.

They recognized Thorn from the battle. There must have been survivors that had gotten away from him after all. When Thorn made it to the center of the arena the crowd closed up behind him. Once there Cardan spoke up from his throne. "The Undersea would like to put forth an additional condition to your challenge." He boomed over the room and Thorn rolled his eyes.

"Yeah I bet they would," he smirked as he shot a fierce look at a few of the knights at the edge of the crowd and for a second, Nikki thought she actually saw them flinch.

"You will fight as though a human being would. No more and no less," the King decreed and the Knight opposite of Thorn let a confident smirk streak across his lips.

"Should you break the conditions set to you…" Cardan began to speak again but took a long pause so long and drawn out that Nikki's gaze actually shifted to the King and away from Thorn.

'Is he still drunk?' she wondered silently, but when her eyes met his she couldn't deny that he had a positively scheming smile plastered on his lips.

"You will not leave this place while you still draw breath," he finished and Thorn shot the king a curious glance as well. The crowd began to laugh and while Nikki stood there horrified at the Kings words, she noted silently that Kaye and Thorn almost looked...relieved? Surprised to be sure but...something in their faces seemed...curious somehow.

Thorn wasn't sure himself, but he thought the King of all Faerie had just granted him a kindness that he wasn't sure he'd done anything to deserve.

His companion on the other hand, "No," Nikki stepped forward, intending to go to Thorn. She felt Kaye's fingers thread into hers and hold her back and twisted in her grip to find Kaye shaking her head. "Let me go," Nikki pleaded.

"You know I can't…" Kaye said sternly. "There is nothing we can do about this. We just have to believe Thorn knows what he's doing."

"So I'm just supposed to stand here and watch him die?!" Nikki shouted and she looked back to find Thorn looking back at her. He must have heard her through the road of the crowd. As she studied his face though a thought occurred to her. Her mind traced back a few minutes and lingered on the kiss again and this time, realization flooded her brain.

He smiled. A gentle smile that she'd never seen him give to her before. Her mind began to race as she remembered all the times her fake mother had kissed her on the cheek when she was on her way out of the house for school. Or all the times her fake father had kissed her goodnight on the forehead. The softness of Thorn's lips pressed up against hers so gently that she'd barely felt the kiss at all felt just like that. A kiss too quick to let her ponder what it had meant.

Thorn had kissed her goodbye.

"Begin," Nikki heard Cardan say over the noise of the crowd and she watched as Thorn and Knight began to circle around the open area of the room. Nikki's heart began to race as her fingertips brushed along her lower lip and she felt Kaye's grip tighten in her hand. She was nervous too. Nikki wasn't the only one who had something riding on Thorn in this duel she guessed. He'd defended the Court of Termites with his life and killed dozens of Undersea Knights. Kaye probably felt that if he died here that none of them would ever have the chance to properly thank him for the service...not to mention that they were friends.

Nikki watched as Thorn grew tired of waiting and attacked first, striking out with a jab from the spear which the knight whirled away from easily. Carrying his momentum through his spin, the knight slashed at Thorn and Thorn had to drop to his hands and knees to evade. She heard Kaye suck in a breath before she spoke. "He may be used to working something like that but it isn't strong enough."

"What do you mean?" Nikki felt panic rising in her voice.

"He's only going to get a few parries out of it before the asshole cuts right through it," Kaye explained. "It's gonna take more energy to dodge than to block and Thorn will eventually get tired and be forced to parry. After that it's only a matter of time before Thorn has no weapon left...he needs to win this quickly."

Nikki looked back to the fight as she heard the tip of Thorn's spear hit the floor with a clang. He'd stabbed with it again and this time the knight had batted the blow downward and away from him with his blade. It had been metal on metal and the weapon didn't seem damaged but still, it made Nikki cringe. The knight stamped his foot down on the flat head of the spear and pinned it to the ground but he had overcommitted to the move.

When he'd set his foot down the spear hadn't been flat with the ground and the Knight had lost his footing and took a moment to adjust himself before he could swing.

Thorn surged his shoulder forward and into the knight's chest before extending his arm and continuing to push until the knight had fallen backward out of Thorn's reach. Nikki sighed in relief as he righted himself and stabbed again at the knight, this time connecting with his shoulder pads, but only just. The spear sliced clean through the leather and just barely grazed the Knight's flesh beneath, the silvertip coming out stained with a runny and pale red.

The knight righted himself though and batted the spear away again. This time the knight settled himself and waited for Thorn to approach him. He raised his blade back up in front of him and took a long breath as Nikki began to chew on her nails nervously.

Thorn swung the spear sideways as quickly as he could and the Knight parried easily. As the spear bounced back Thorn slipped his hand down its shaft to bring it's momentum down but as he did Nikki saw his hand let go of the wooden shaft as he flinched. The sword had chipped the shaft and Thorn had jammed his hand into the splintered wood without thinking.

The knight stabbed forward with his blade and Thorn barely managed to dodge the blow. The knight followed up with his free hand though and when Nikki saw his leather-clad knuckles collide with Thorn's shoulder she shuddered.

Thorn staggered back with his teeth grit and she could hear him grunt in pain over the screams and cheers of the crowd.

She'd cut his stitches out over a week ago but just because the wound had sealed didn't mean it'd healed completely. That bite had been incredibly deep and Thorn's muscles had been seriously torn up. He held his spear in his now limp arm and his other hand rushed up to put pressure onto his shoulder as he shuffled backward and Nikki felt Kaye's grip on her hand tighten. Nikki's grip intensified too, each of them grabbing the other hard enough for their knuckles to turn white.

Nikki became even more worried when she thought she saw Thorn's shoulder pop out for a moment. "He's gonna change," she gasped and felt Kaye holding her in place just in case she tried to run.

"He can do this," Kaye reiterated as they saw Thorn raise his weapon again before his shoulder set back into place. "He has to."

Thorn charged. The knight seemed taken aback for a moment by Thorn's speed, the wolf boy getting inside the Knights reach before he could even raise his sword again to react.

In moments Thorn's grip was on the Knight's throat and his other hand went behind his knee. He yanked his arm back toward him and the Knight toppled backward, Thorn falling with him. Their weapons clattered to the ground and then Thorn was on top of the creature, raining punches down on it's barely protected face.

Thin red blood began to spatter across the polished floor of the hall, staining Thorn's knuckles and shirt as well.

Nikki could see small patches of fur starting to spread across Thorn's neck and his bare arms as he continued until the knight no longer reacted to his punches.

This was it, Thorn had lost control. Nikki wrenched out of Kaye's grasp and tried to push through the crowd to the front, calling out for Thorn over and over again. He couldn't hear her anymore. His hands went to the knight's throat and the crowd hushed as Cardan stood from his throne and spoke. "You have won human," he mused but Thorn didn't release the Knight. He kept tightening his grip on the soldier and his joints began popping in and out of place as Cardan spoke again but Thorn couldn't hear him.

The Undersea Knights began to protest, shouting over the hollering crowd. They were saying that Thorn had cheated. That he was borrowing strength from the wolf when he'd taken the knight down. Nikki barely heard them either. Her heart was pounding far too loudly in her ears to understand much of anything being shouted around the mass of Faeries. She pushed through the crowd and fell to her knees as she finally made it through the last row of creatures.

She was only a few feet from him now and she could see how his bloody fingers were bright white around the sea-folk's throat and his fangs were starting to grow longer. Nikki could barely find the will to say anything. He looked so completely wild and utterly out of control.

"Thorn," was all she managed to breathe out as the noise of the Hall drowned everything else away from her. This was no time for backing down. If she didn't stop him from turning then he was going to die here and she couldn't have that on her conscience.

"Thorn!" She shouted over the crowd. He didn't hear her, or, if he did, he didn't react. She crawled to him and threw her arms around him from the side and tried to pull him away but he shook her off of him and she fell back onto the floor. "Thorn stop!" She shouted and this time his vision snapped to her.

The look in his eyes sent a shiver down her spine as she recalled the only other time she'd seen it. Back in the motel after he'd wrapped her up and lost control of himself. His eyes matched the wolves that had intended to eat her. Nikki swallowed nervously before she rocked forward back onto her hands and knees and slowly crawled toward him. She kept her eyes locked with his and went as slow as she could. She thought she could hear faeries laughing all around her but she didn't care.

She wasn't going to let a little embarrassment stop her from trying to save Thorn from himself. She crawled so close that she could feel his breath on her cheeks before she spoke.

"Thorn please," she pleaded as softly as she could to him. "I need you to stop." He flinched. She looked down and placed her hands on his, stroking them gently as she tried her best to not look at the bloody pulp of the Undersea Knight's face. "Please," she begged him and she felt his grip begin to loosen.

Slowly, and to her own surprise, the patches of fur on his skin began to recede and some of the color started coming back into his eyes and fingers. His jaw hung open, teeth slowly shrinking back down to their normal size as he stared at her.

"Nik," he breathed out before he moved to look down to see what his fingers were wrapped around. She caught his chin though and forced him to look back at her instead.

"No no just look at me," she pleaded and Thorn's eyes widened as he saw hers fill with tears. For once though, he found a small smile pulling across Nikki's lips. "You did it."

Nikki leaned in and pressed a short kiss to his cheek as she felt his hands return to his own lap and his neck twist as he looked around the room.

"However," Cardan boomed over the crowd and Nikki felt her heart sink. "I'm afraid you broke the terms of the duel human."

Nikki stood from where she had been kneeling with Thorn on the floor of the Great Hall. "Please," she said as she walked around Thorn, feeling the entire crowd's eyes on her as she sank back to her knees and pressed her forehead to the floor. "He didn't change! He fought fair!" She croaked loudly, trying to hide how badly her voice was hitching in her throat.

"He borrowed strength from the wolf," Cardan said flatly. "I did not say he couldn't change. I said he must fight as a human and nothing more."

Nikki began to breathe quicker as she turned back to Thorn and threw herself at him. She wrapped her arms around him and held him like she'd never let him go. "Then you'll have to kill me too," she sobbed.

She had never thought she could feel this ready to die for somebody else in her life. She meant it though. Every word. She wasn't about to let Thorn go for anybody.

"Who said anything about an execution?" Cardan smirked and the procession of the Undersea turned to him with confusion in their faces. "The human did win the duel," Cardan pronounced again and he turned to face Queen Orla who was positioned by his side. "Return what you have taken from the girl," Cardan demanded.

Nikki turned back to the King and, through tear-stained eyes, she saw the amulet flying through the air toward her. She stretched out and caught the necklace before it hit the ground, for fear that it may shatter and all of this would have been for nothing. It was then that Kaye poked out of the crowd and ran to Nikki, snatched her by the wrist and yanked her away from Thorn.

Nikki gasped in surprise before she twisted in Kaye's grasp to try and turn back to Thorn who still sat, half-dazed, on the floor of the hall. "No! Let me go!" She writhed in Kaye's arms. Her skin was on fire and her blood boiled with anger as she clawed and kicked to try and get free.

"Wolfman," Cardan said and Nikki watched as Thorn slowly turned his head to where Cardan sat above them. "I curse you," he said softly and lifted his hand until the crowd saw him pointing down at Thorn. Nikki thought she saw the King pause for a moment before he spoke up again. His vision slowly turned between Thorn and to Nikki before it seemed to follow something else across the room and out of sight.

His vision slowly sank back to Thorn and Nikki thought she could see a pleasure-filled smirk work its way across Cardan's lips. "I curse you to sleep. Sleep so deeply that you may not wake again...until love has left your heart."

The words hung in the air as Nikki's jaw dropped and she froze. Her eyes darted to Thorn and she saw what looked like a smile on his lips as he began to fall backward.

His eyes were fluttering shut and she felt Kaye let go of her. She was on her knees in only a moment her arms grabbing for Thorn's shirt to hold him up and keep him from hitting his head on the marbled floor.

Once she'd caught him, she pulled him to her and rest his head on her knees and she held him, tears falling from her cheeks onto his and she gripped his shirt tightly. "No," she sobbed as she looked up to where Kaye stood above them. The crowd was wild. Even the knights of the Undersea were laughing. "Kaye I," Nikki breathed out as her chest began to rise and fall faster and faster. Her vision began to swim as the fantastical colors of the hall blurred around her. "I can't," she gasped as she felt a hand take hers, stroking its thumb across the back of her palm. She looked down to find Thorn squinting up at her. He was breathing calmly and his form had completely returned to normal but she could tell he was struggling to stay awake.

"Thorn," she cried as she grabbed his hand and pressed it to her tear-soaked cheek. "Please don't go...I don't want you to go," she pleaded but she just saw his smile widen.

"I know..." he breathed out. "You'll be okay now though. It's okay," he sighed as she felt his hand go limp against her cheek. She grabbed for his hand as it fell and lifted it back up to her lips before she pressed a desperate kiss into his palm. She drank in the scent of the blood on his hand, the sweat he was lightly coated in, but mostly she just smelled him. That scent that had bothered her nose so much at first had become the one thing she wanted to smell all the time.

"No I won't!" She half cried. "I need you! I!" Nikki began to hyperventilate more and more as she struggled to keep calm. Kaye moved to her side and rested her hands on her shoulders. Thorn's eyes fluttered shut and Kaye felt Nikki's shoulders begin to tremble more as her tears flowed. "I…" she cried as she pressed her hands into Thorn's cheeks. This was it. She was going to faint. The room had been spinning for too long. She could barely even see Thorn laying in her lap. Lack of breaths had quickly spun her dizzy and she felt utterly empty and.

Darkness began to creep in from the edges of her vision and the tears falling from her eyes only served to obstruct her view of him more.

"I love you, Thorn," she choked out before her vision went dark and she fell limp into Kaye's arms.

The End


	14. Epilogue

You climb six lonely sad stairs to your apartment

After another graveyard shift in the cold dull light of morning.

You walked in just in time to catch her as she's leaving

But the schedules and the conflicts kept the roof over our heads.

-The Wonder Years, Teenage Parents

Epilogue

The scissors chomped on the thread over and over again and the pixie watched as the Witch's face grew more and more concerned. As if she'd never seen the pair fail to cut through something before. They were certainly magical but after a few more attempts it became clear that this enchantment was too strong for them.

It had been much the same at every other curse breaker she'd come to. None of them could break the spell she'd woven and accidentally screwed herself over with. The thread was just too strong. She was attached to him now and there didn't seem to be a way out of it other than the only thing she wasn't willing to do.

She couldn't face him after all this time. Especially not when it was just to break the connection. He'd probably eat her. At least she thought that would probably be his first reaction. She couldn't think of anything else that the wolfman would want to do to her. He'd given up searching for her over a year ago at this point and she'd figured that that would be the end of it.

She stood to leave and the witch pulled back and sighed. "What did you do?"

"I cursed him to love me...I guess," she admitted.

"And you cannot break this curse yourself?"

"I've tried. I think I could break it in person but I doubt I'll get that chance if he catches up to me. I'd like to break it without dying in the process," she sighed and headed for the door.

Once back out on the street she turned down the sidewalk and tried to look on the bright side. The wolf hated this weather. Maybe he wouldn't come down to chase her. She'd taken to hiding in the French Quarter in New Orleans to avoid him. Even in the winter, it was quite cold enough for him to be comfortable here and in the summer there was no way he'd come after her. He'd probably melt. Not to mention that she actually liked here. Very little iron around, plenty of parties, both fae and not, and many of her own kind blended in here.

This town was a haven for Faeries. They could act like themselves and most people were too drunk to ever tell the difference. Not to mention all the people that walked the streets in costume during city-wide parties were perfect for blending in. Half the time she didn't even have to glamour herself at all and most people didn't look at her twice.

There were plenty of distractions too. Ways to forget the knot on her finger and the red thread floating thought the air around her that only faeries could see. It had raised questions in her kind when she came around, and they all wanted to know who had cursed her. She'd dodge the questions as best she could to try and avoid mentioning the boy she'd left behind.

It hurt too much to talk about him. It hurt bad enough being trapped in her own mind with her regrets, never mind having to actually let them out and tell other people how monumentally she'd screwed her own life up. She wished she'd never made the damn ring. It was meant to be a gift to him. A promise to him that he would always be able to find her wherever she went so that they could always find their way back to each other. Faeries love can be fleeting and they are meant to be free and wild. She hated being stuck in one place and she was so scared to be happy with him that she'd decided that being alone would be less terrifying.

She'd been right of course. Being alone meant that she couldn't hurt anybody. It meant that she was free to roam wherever she wished.

What it didn't mean was she wouldn't feel guilty when she touched someone else. That she wouldn't hate herself for having to hurt him to gain this freedom that she had so desperately craved. That she wouldn't dream of him every night. That that stupid song wouldn't be stuck in her head for the rest of her long and lonely life. She'd had to go out of her way to find excuses to listen to it on more than one occasion.

Public libraries with computers were the easiest way for her to listen to it alone. Sometimes she had to resort to glamouring bartenders to play it over the loudspeakers while she was drunk. She'd never expected to miss hearing it so much.

She'd caught herself humming it more than a few times, even singing it once or twice without really meaning too. It wasn't like faerie music. It was rough, and not at all whimsical. She wasn't even sure if it was a love song. Parts of it seemed to be but others seemed to be just the opposite.

She also didn't know how they fit into the narrative of it. At first, she'd thought they were the Blackbirds. Looking down from their perch and laughing at the humans that dawdled away in their pointless short lives. Lately, she'd thought that instead, they might be the couple that was separated by hundreds of miles. She hadn't called him at least. She was the one who had run away from home.

After all she'd done, she was the one who ended up having to be strong. Strong enough to stay away and let him start over no matter how much she wanted to come home and it certainly wasn't easy anymore.

She'd be lying to herself if she thought that it had ever been easy at all.


End file.
